NCT05159037

Using the Musical Track From GC-MRT as a Treatment Booster in Stressful Situations

Using the Musical Track From Gaze-Contingent Music Reward Therapy as a Treatment Booster in Stressful Situations Among Highly Socially Anxious Participants

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 60 (actual)
• Sponsor: Tel Aviv University · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

The study examines whether musical tracks played during gaze contingent music reward therapy (GC-MRT) for social anxiety could later be used as a booster to reduce anxiety before a stressful situation. To this end, highly socially anxious participants will undergo 4 GC-MRT sessions designed to train participants' attention away from threat and towards neutral social stimuli. Subsequently, participants will be asked to perform a socially stressful speech task. Prior to the speech, half of the participants will listen to a musical track the participants were trained with, and half of the participants will listen to a musical track the participants like but were not trained with during the GC-MRT sessions. The investigators expect that listening to musical track taken from the GC-MRT sessions will moderate the increase in anxiety levels prior to the speech and will improve performance during the speech compared to a non-trained musical track.

Detailed description

Gaze contingent music reward therapy (GC-MRT) is designed to modify threat-related attention biases through operational conditioning between beloved music and gaze patterns favoring neutral stimuli over threat-related stimuli. GC-MRT has shown efficacy in reducing social anxiety symptoms. The current study is designed to explore whether the musical tracks played during the GC-MRT conditioning could be later used as a treatment booster to reduce anxiety in a socially stressful situation. To this end, 60 high socially anxious participants will undergo four GC-MRT sessions and then will be asked to perform a stressful speech task. Prior to the speech, half of the participants (randomly determined) will listen to a musical track the participants were trained with, and half of the participants will listen to a musical track the participants like but were not trained with during GC-MRT sessions. The investigators expect that the listening to musical track taken from the GC-MRT sessions will moderate the increase in anxiety levels prior to the speech and will improve performance during the speech compared to a non-trained musical track.

Conditions

• Social Anxiety

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	Gaze Contingent Music Reward Therapy	Feedback according to participants' viewing patterns, in order to modify their attention.
BEHAVIORAL	Music Booster	Participants listen to a musical track they ranked as highly liked before a stressful situation

Timeline

• Start date: 2021-11-07
• Primary completion: 2022-06-20
• Completion: 2022-06-20
• First posted: 2021-12-15
• Last updated: 2022-06-22

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Israel