Journal article 316 views 34 downloads
Far from the threatening crowd: Generalisation of conditioned threat expectancy and fear in COVID-19 lockdown
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Gemma Cuddihy,
Daniel Zuj,
Martyn Quigley
Learning & Behavior, Volume: 52, Pages: 262 - 271
Swansea University Authors:
Simon Dymond , Gemma Cuddihy, Daniel Zuj, Martyn Quigley
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© The Author(s) 2024. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
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DOI (Published version): 10.3758/s13420-024-00625-4
Abstract
Fear and anxiety are rarely confined to specific stimuli or situations. In fear generalisation, there is a spread of fear responses elicited by physically dissimilar generalisation stimuli (GS) along a continuum between danger and safety. The current study investigated fear generalisation with a nov...
| Published in: | Learning & Behavior |
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| ISSN: | 1543-4494 1543-4508 |
| Published: |
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
2024
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| Online Access: |
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| URI: | https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa65538 |
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| Abstract: |
Fear and anxiety are rarely confined to specific stimuli or situations. In fear generalisation, there is a spread of fear responses elicited by physically dissimilar generalisation stimuli (GS) along a continuum between danger and safety. The current study investigated fear generalisation with a novel online task using COVID-19-relevant stimuli (i.e., busy or quiet shopping street/mall scenes) during pandemic lockdown restrictions in the United Kingdom. Participants (N = 50) first completed clinically relevant trait measures before commencing a habituation phase, where two conditioned stimuli (CSs; i.e., a busy or quiet high street/mall scene) were presented. Participants then underwent fear conditioning where one conditioned stimulus (CS+) was followed by an aversive unconditioned stimulus (US; a loud female scream accompanied by a facial photograph of a female displaying a fearful emotion) and another (CS-) was not. In a test phase, six generalisation stimuli were presented where the US was withheld, and participants provided threat expectancy and fear ratings for all stimuli. Following successful conditioning, fear generalization was observed for both threat expectancy and fear ratings. Trait worry partially predicted generalised threat expectancy and COVID-19 fear strongly predicted generalised fear. In conclusion, a generalisation gradient was evident using an online remote generalisation task with images of busy/quiet streets during the pandemic. Worry and fear of COVID-19 predicted fear generalisation. |
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| Keywords: |
Generalisation; Threat expectancy; Fear conditioning; COVID-19; Worry |
| College: |
Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences |
| Funders: |
This work was supported by a Ser Cymru Welsh Government Office for Science (Ser Cymru Tackling COVID-19) grant (WG Project Number 95). |
| Start Page: |
262 |
| End Page: |
271 |