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Completed

NCT Number: NCT03437317

Emotional Perceptual Training as a Treatment for Social Anxiety: Behavioral and Neural Evidence.

The Perceptual Training Study is a series of studies performed with the purpose of identifying a potential avenue for treatment of mood disorders, particularly anxiety-based mood disorders. The underlying theme is that neural representations may be threat-oriented, and may also be generalized to non-threatening cues by means of similarity to threatening representations. These may result in anxiety symptoms from innocuous cues. The idea behind the perceptual training is to create a divorce between the threat representations and cues which should be considered non-threatening, enhancing perceptual acuity and potentially reducing anxiety symptoms.

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Key information

Conditions

Anxiety Disorders and Symptoms Anxiety Disorders Mental Disorders Phobia, Social Phobic Disorders Social Anxiety Disorder

Age range

18 year–35 year

Sex eligibility

All sexes

Study type

Interventional

Phase

Not applicable

Who can participate

Healthy volunteers accepted: Yes

Only the study team can determine whether someone qualifies for participation.

Inclusion criteria

  • Right-handed
  • Normal or corrected-to-normal vision

Exclusion criteria

  • History of a diagnosed neurological or Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders - IV Axis I disorder
  • Currently taking prescribed psychoactive drugs, including anti-depressants or anxiolytics.
  • Having electrically, magnetically, or mechanically activated implants (e.g. cardiac pacemakers), due to incompatibility with MRI and MEG systems.
  • Pregnancy or suspected pregnancy

Treatment and study plan

Perceptual Retraining

Behavioral

Participants viewed faces varying in their expression of anger and were asked to identify if the face was angry or neutral via button press. Participants were provided with feedback if their categorization of the face as neutral or angry was correct. Each participant was assigned 4 levels of angry faces based on their decision point of anger detection in faces. Faces were selected based on the closest existing anger morph to the category boundary; for example, a decision point of 40% anger was closest to the 38% anger face, and so the faces used would have been 17%, 31%, 45%, and 59% anger. For this example, responses of "neutral" to the 31% angry face would be marked as correct, whereas a similar response to the 45% angry face would be incorrect, as it was above their decision point.

Gender Discrimination

Behavioral

Participants viewed faces varying in their expression of anger and were asked to identify if the face was male or female via button press.

Primary outcomes

  1. Behavioral Evidence for Categorical Perception Changes

    Time frame: Baseline to Study Completion (14 to 28 Days)

    Participants will be asked to respond if they detected anger in faces varying in their levels of anger expression. This task is used to determine a perceptual bias for threat/anger in faces that is related to increases in social anxiety symptoms, and assess for improvements in the categorization of angry vs. neutral faces. that align with modulations of neural responses (MEG and EEG evidence) indexing perceptual processing of the faces following perceptual retraining.

  2. Neural Evidence for Categorical Perception Changes

    Time frame: Baseline to Study Completion (14 to 28 Days)

    Neural activity will be recorded using EEG and MEG to measure neural processes underpinning categorical perception of anger in faces. Changes in this neural perceptual index will be assessed following perceptual retraining to provide a neural mechanism underpinning behavioral improvements in perceptual categorization and subsequent reductions in anxiety.

Secondary outcomes

  1. Social Anxiety Symptoms - Social Phobia Scale

    Time frame: Baseline to Study Completion (14 to 28 Days)

    Change in social anxiety symptomatology through perceptual retraining

  2. Social Anxiety Symptoms - Liebowitz Social Anxiety Scale

    Time frame: Baseline to Study Completion (14 to 28 Days)

    Change in social anxiety symptomatology through perceptual retraining

Sponsors and collaborators

Lead sponsor

Florida State University

Other

Collaborators

  • Medical College of Wisconsin

Registry information

Acronym: PTL

Important dates

Study start
2014
Primary completion
2016
Study completion
2016
First posted
Feb 19, 2018
Registry last updated
Feb 19, 2018

OpenTrials presents study information sourced from ClinicalTrials.gov. The official registry record should be consulted for the latest information.

View the official ClinicalTrials.gov record (opens in a new tab)

This listing is for discovery and informational purposes only. It is not medical advice, does not guarantee that a study is recruiting, and does not determine eligibility. Contact the study team and a qualified healthcare professional when considering participation.

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