One-session Treatment for Spider Fears
Completed · Not applicable
Conditions studied: Spider Phobia
In brief
Despite the efficacy of exposure and response prevention (ERP) for anxiety and phobias, recent theoretical research on fear extinction via inhibitory learning suggests that cognitive restructuring (CR)--the explicit challenging of maladaptive beliefs (e.g,. overestimation of threat)--may actually attenuate exposure outcomes during an exposure trial. That is, by verbally disputing certain beliefs (e.g., "the spider will jump on me and attack me and I will faint from the anxiety") before an exposure task (e.g., gradually approaching a non-venomous spider), anxious individuals may experience less "surprise" from the non-occurrence of feared outcomes, and consequently experience less inhibitory learning (e.g., learning that spiders are not inherently dangerous). Thus, the investigators aim to empirically test the conventional (yet recently challenged) assumption that cognitive restructuring is a necessary component for psychosocial interventions for phobias. 90 participants recruited from the Psychology Department Participant Pool and the community will participate in this study. All participants will meet DSM-5 criteria for spider phobia. Following consent, participants will complete a pre-test assessment of various aspects of spider phobia. Participants will then receive education about the nature of anxiety/spider phobia and be randomly assigned to one of three 45-min intervention conditions: (a) CR before EXP, (b) EXP before CR, and (c) stress management (a control condition that involves neither CR nor EXP). Following the intervention, participants will complete a 10-minute post-test assessment and be scheduled to return for a follow-up assessment a month later.
Key facts
- Study ID
- NCT03410264
- Run by
- University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
- People needed
- 51
- Starts
- 2018-01-20
- Expected to finish
- 2020-04-08
- Last updated by the study team
- 2021-03-08
Who can join
Age: 18 and older. Sex: any. Healthy volunteers: not accepted.
You may qualify if…
- Participants must
- be 18 years or older,
- be fluent in English, and
- meet DSM-5 criteria for specific (spider) phobia to be considered eligible
You may not qualify if…
- Participants will be deemed ineligible if they do not meet the above inclusion criteria or
- are allergic to spiders or bee stings,
- are experiencing current psychosis, mania, or substance abuse, or
- successfully complete 10 of 13 possible BAT steps in the pretreatment appointment (to ensure that participants are indeed spider phobic at pretreatment).
Where it is running
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill — Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States
Full record on ClinicalTrials.gov
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