NCT04663672

Efficacy of Targeted Memory Reactivation for Enhancing Exposure Therapy

Placebo-Controlled, Randomized, Double-Blind Study of the Efficacy of Targeted Memory Reactivation for Enhancing Exposure Therapy

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 158 (actual)
• Sponsor: University of Texas at Austin · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years – 65 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

This study evaluates whether a scent applied during exposure therapy and during subsequent sleep will increase the durability of treatment effects for individuals with fear of spiders, contamination, and enclosed spaces.

Detailed description

Newly acquired memories encoded during wakefulness are spontaneously re-activated during sleep, resulting in synaptic potentiation and strengthening of the re-activated traces. Targeted memory reactivation (TMR) typically involves a period of initial learning in the presence of an olfactory or auditory contextual cue, coupled with later presentation of the cue during sleep to ostensibly facilitate memory reactivation and consolidation. Numerous studies have found evidence of improved task performance subsequent to cue-induced neuronal replay, however application of TMR to treatment of naturally acquired, clinically significant fear has been limited. The present study will will provide a rigorous test of TMR's efficacy as an augmentative strategy for exposure therapy. It is hypothesized that participants who sleep in the presence of the same odor that they are exposed to during exposure therapy will exhibit reduced fear at follow up, relative to participants who sleep in the presence of a different odor, or a non-odorous control.

Conditions

• Claustrophobia
• Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
• Arachnophobia

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Experimental Scent	Participants will sleep in the presence of the exposure scent, delivered by an Airwick Essential Oils diffuser
OTHER	Control Scent	Participants will sleep in the presence of a novel scent, delivered by an Airwick Essential Oils diffuser
OTHER	No-Scent Control	Participants will sleep in the presence of an odorless control vehicle, delivered by an Airwick Essential Oils diffuser
BEHAVIORAL	In-Vivo Exposure	Participants will receive 40 minutes of in-vivo exposure therapy to feared targets in the presence of a distinctive exposure scent.

Timeline

• Start date: 2019-01-29
• Primary completion: 2020-03-01
• Completion: 2020-03-01
• First posted: 2020-12-11
• Last updated: 2020-12-11

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States