Forcadell Eduard, Torrents-Rodas David, Treen Devi, Fullana Miquel A, Tortella-Feliu Miquel
Department of Psychiatry and Forensic Medicine, School of Medicine, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
Department of Mental Health, Parc Taulí Hospital Universitari, Institut d'Investigació i Innovació Parc Taulí I3PT, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Sabadell, Spain.
Front Psychol. 2017 Sep 26;8:1654. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2017.01654. eCollection 2017.
Attentional control (AC) and fear extinction learning are known to be involved in pathological anxiety. In this study we explored whether individual differences in non-emotional AC were associated with individual differences in the magnitude and gradient of fear extinction (learning and recall). In 50 individuals with fear of spiders, we collected measures of non-emotional AC by means of self-report and by assessing the functioning of the major attention networks (executive control, orienting, and alerting). The participants then underwent a paradigm assessing fear extinction learning and extinction recall. The two components of the orienting network functioning (costs and benefits) were significantly associated with fear extinction gradient over and above the effects of trait anxiety. Specifically, participants with enhanced orienting costs (i.e., difficulties in disengaging attention from cues not relevant for the task) showed faster extinction learning, while those with enhanced orienting benefits (i.e., attention facilitated by valid cues) exhibited faster extinction recall as measured by fear-potentiated startle and Unconditioned Stimulus expectancies, respectively. Our findings suggest that, in non-emotional conditions, the orienting component of attention may be predictive of fear extinction. They also show that the use of fear extinction gradients and the exploration of individual differences in non-emotional AC (using performance-based measures of attentional network functioning) can provide a better understanding of individual differences in fear learning. Our findings also may help to understand differences in exposure therapy outcomes.
注意控制（AC）和恐惧消退学习被认为与病理性焦虑有关。在本研究中，我们探讨了非情绪性AC的个体差异是否与恐惧消退（学习和回忆）的程度及梯度的个体差异相关。在50名害怕蜘蛛的个体中，我们通过自我报告以及评估主要注意网络（执行控制、定向和警觉）的功能来收集非情绪性AC的测量数据。参与者随后接受了一个评估恐惧消退学习和消退回忆的范式。定向网络功能的两个组成部分（代价和益处）在特质焦虑的影响之外，与恐惧消退梯度显著相关。具体而言，定向代价增强的参与者（即难以将注意力从与任务无关的线索上脱离）表现出更快的消退学习，而定向益处增强的参与者（即有效线索促进注意力）分别通过恐惧增强惊吓和无条件刺激预期测量，表现出更快的消退回忆。我们的研究结果表明，在非情绪条件下，注意的定向成分可能预测恐惧消退。它们还表明，使用恐惧消退梯度以及探索非情绪性AC的个体差异（使用基于表现的注意网络功能测量）可以更好地理解恐惧学习中的个体差异。我们的研究结果也可能有助于理解暴露疗法结果的差异。
