Herten Nadja, Otto Tobias, Adolph Dirk, Pause Bettina M, Kumsta Robert, Wolf Oliver T
Department of Cognitive Psychology.
Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy.
Behav Neurosci. 2016 Oct;130(5):521-530. doi: 10.1037/bne0000156. Epub 2016 Jun 30.
Cortisol release in a stressful situation can be beneficial for memory encoding and memory consolidation. Stimuli, such as odors, related to the stressful episode may successfully cue memory contents of the stress experience. The current investigation aimed at testing the potency of stress to influence startle responsivity 24 hr later and to implicitly reactivate emotional memory traces triggered by an odor involved. Participants were assigned to either a stress (Trier Social Stress Test [TSST]) or control (friendly TSST [f-TSST]) condition featuring an ambient odor. On the next day, participants underwent an auditory startle paradigm while their eyeblink reflex was recorded by an electrooculogram. Three different olfactory stimuli were delivered, one being the target odor presented the day before. Additionally, negative, positive, and pictures of the committee members were included for comparing general startle responsivity and fear-potentiated startle. Participants of the stress group demonstrated an enhanced startle response across all stimuli compared to participants of the control group. There were no specific effects with regard to the target odor. The typical fear-potentiated startle response occurred. Stressed participants tended to rate the target odor more aversive than control participants. Odor recognition memory did not differ between the groups, suggesting an implicit effect on odor valence. Our results show that acute stress exposure enhances startle responsivity 24 hr later. This effect might be caused by a shift of amygdala function causing heightened sensitivity, but lower levels of specificity. (PsycINFO Database Record
在压力情境下释放的皮质醇可能有助于记忆编码和记忆巩固。与压力事件相关的刺激，如气味，可能会成功地提示压力经历的记忆内容。当前的研究旨在测试压力对24小时后惊吓反应性的影响，并隐性地重新激活由相关气味触发的情绪记忆痕迹。参与者被分配到有环境气味的压力（特里尔社会压力测试[TSST]）或对照（友好TSST[f-TSST]）条件下。第二天，参与者接受听觉惊吓范式，同时通过眼电图记录他们的眨眼反射。提供了三种不同的嗅觉刺激，其中一种是前一天呈现的目标气味。此外，还包括负面、正面和委员会成员的图片，用于比较一般惊吓反应性和恐惧增强惊吓。与对照组的参与者相比，压力组的参与者在所有刺激下都表现出增强的惊吓反应。对于目标气味没有特定影响。出现了典型的恐惧增强惊吓反应。与对照组参与者相比，处于压力下的参与者倾向于将目标气味评为更厌恶。两组之间的气味识别记忆没有差异，这表明对气味效价有隐性影响。我们的结果表明，急性压力暴露会在24小时后增强惊吓反应性。这种效应可能是由杏仁核功能的转变引起的，导致敏感性提高，但特异性降低。（PsycINFO数据库记录）
