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Updated: Feb 26, 2026
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Using the Threat Probability Task to Assess Anxiety and Fear During Uncertain and Certain Threat
Published on: September 12, 2014
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Directed threat imagery in generalized anxiety disorder
C Buff1, C Schmidt1, L Brinkmann1
1Institute of Medical Psychology and Systems Neuroscience,University of Muenster,Von-Esmarch-Str. 52, 48149 Muenster,Germany.
Psychological Medicine
|July 25, 2017
Summary
Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) patients show heightened emotional reactivity to threat imagery, involving specific brain networks. This study reveals neural correlates of directed threat imagery in GAD, crucial for cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT).
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Psychiatry
- Cognitive Psychology
Background:
- Worrying may impede processing of fears.
- Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) uses directed threat imagery to induce emotional reactivity in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) patients.
- Neural correlates of this process in GAD are understudied.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the neural correlates of directed threat imagery in GAD patients.
- To understand emotional reactivity during fear exposure in GAD.
Main Methods:
- Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used.
- 19 GAD patients and 19 healthy controls (HC) were exposed to disorder-related and neutral scripts.
- Participants vividly imagined the script content.
Main Results:
- GAD patients reported disorder-related scripts as more anxiety-inducing and arousing than HC.
- fMRI revealed elevated amygdala, dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, and thalamus activity in GAD patients.
- Reduced activity in ventromedial prefrontal cortex/subgenual anterior cingulate cortex was observed in GAD patients compared to HC.
Conclusions:
- This study provides the first behavioral and neural evidence of emotional reactivity during directed threat imagery in GAD.
- The observed brain activity pattern implicates a fear processing network in GAD during initial exposure in CBT.
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