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Effect of anxiety on behavioural pattern separation in humans
Nicholas L Balderston1, Ambika Mathur1, Joel Adu-Brimpong1
1a Section on Neurobiology of Fear and Anxiety , National Institute of Mental Health, National Institutes of Health , Bethesda , MD , USA.
Cognition & Emotion
|October 20, 2015
Summary
Anxiety impacts behavioural pattern separation (BPS), the ability to discern similar stimuli. This study found that threat during encoding improved accuracy for stimuli later retrieved under safety, suggesting anxiety alters BPS and may explain fear overgeneralisation.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive neuroscience
- Psychology
- Neuroscience
Background:
- Behavioural pattern separation (BPS) is crucial for distinguishing similar stimuli and understanding stimulus generalisation.
- Fear overgeneralisation is a hallmark of posttraumatic stress disorder and anxiety disorders, but its link to BPS is not well understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the effect of anxiety, induced by the threat of shock, on BPS.
- To examine how encoding and retrieval conditions influence BPS in the context of threat and safety.
Main Methods:
- A 2x2 factorial design was employed, assessing BPS across separate encoding and retrieval sessions.
- Participants encoded and retrieved images during blocks of either threat or safety, indicating image status (new, old, or altered).
Main Results:
- Enhanced accuracy was found for altered images encoded during threat periods compared to safety periods.
- This effect was contingent on the images also being retrieved during safety periods.
Conclusions:
- Anxiety, specifically the threat of shock, can alter BPS.
- Altered pattern separation mechanisms may underlie the phenomenon of overgeneralisation observed in anxiety disorders.
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