Research network for the (European) Interdisciplinary study of Fear and Extinction Learning as well as the Return of Fear (EIFEL-ROF)

焦虑症非常普遍，导致个人痛苦和高昂的社会成本。对焦虑的基本机制的了解正在增加，但对为什么有些人会发展（病理性）焦虑而另一些人则不会知之甚少。了解这些个体差异对于启发焦虑的病因，培养弹性，改善诊断和定制治疗至关重要。个体差异是个性化医学革命的关键，但个体差异研究的主要挑战是大样本量和所需的重复研究。研究小组之间更好的沟通、协调和交流以及对跨学科的关注是一个可能的解决方案。EIFEL-ROF科学网络将打造一个跨学科平台，通过研究恐惧条件反射、恐惧消退和恐惧回归，连贯地描绘（病理性）焦虑中个体差异的潜在因素，并汇集来自不同领域的专家，追求共同的目标。EIFEL-ROF将通过研究指南文件、联合发表综述文章和荟萃分析、协调跨实验室复制试验和数据汇集来加强沟通和协调，而无需额外资金。这将需要相关研究小组的小步骤，同时在焦虑研究中创造一个巨大的飞跃。这为研究焦虑（障碍）的个体差异提供了一个重大飞跃，通过汇集足够数量的实验室的力量，这些实验室具有共同的重点，但具有互补的专业知识。

Anxiety disorders are highly prevalent, cause individual suffering and high societal costs. Insight in basic mechanisms of anxiety is increasing, but less is known about why some people develop (pathological) anxiety while others do not. Understanding these individual differences is crucial for enlightening the etiology of anxiety, fostering resilience, and improving diagnostics and tailored treatments. Individual differences represent the key for a personalized medicine revolution but major challenges to individual differences research are posed by the large sample sizes and required replication studies. A better communication coordination and exchange between research groups and a focus on trans-disciplinarity is one possible solution. The scientific network EIFEL-ROF will forge an interdisciplinary platform to coherently delineate the factors underlying individual differences in (pathological) anxiety through the study of fear conditioning, extinction and return of fear and bring together experts from different fields pursuing common goals. EIFEL-ROF will increase communication and coordination through research guidelines papers, joint publication of review articles and meta-analyses, coordination of cross-laboratory replication tests and data pooling without additional funding. This will entail small steps from the individual research groups involved, while creating a giant leap forward in anxiety research. This provides a major leap forward in the study of individual differences in anxiety (disorders) by pooling forces across a sufficient number of labs with a common focus but complementary expertise.