NCT07216222

K08 VR Fear Conditioning

Intracranial Recording and Stimulation of the Human Hippocampal-Amygdala Circuit During Virtual Reality Fear Conditioning

• Status: Enrolling By Invitation
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 70 (estimated)
• Sponsor: University of California, Los Angeles · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years – 70 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

The goal of this clinical trial is to learn how people respond to fear-related experiences in a virtual reality (VR) environment. The study will also look at how brain activity and body responses are connected to learning and memory of fear. To do so, we recruit individuals who are already implanted with a Responsive Neurostimulator (RNS) device for the treatment of epilepsy. This research may help improve our understanding of anxiety disorders and how to better treat them in the future. The main questions it aims to answer are: 1) How do people learn to associate certain cues in VR with feelings of fear or safety? 2) What brain and body responses happen during fear learning? Participants will: 1) Wear a virtual reality headset and experience different environments and sounds, 2) Have their brain activity, heart rate, and sweating measured, and 3) Receive safe, mild electrical pulses through the RNS device during the study to help study fear learning. Participants will attend one or more study sessions, each lasting about 3-4 hours.

Conditions

• Anxiety and Fear
• PTSD
• Veteran

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
DEVICE	Deep Brain Stimulation	Deep brain stimulation via the Responsive Neurostimulator (RNS) device.

Timeline

• Start date: 2025-03-01
• Primary completion: 2028-03-01
• Completion: 2030-02-28
• First posted: 2025-10-14
• Last updated: 2025-10-14

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States

Regulatory

• FDA-regulated device study