Neurobioloigcal mechanisms of Social Return of Fear

治疗创伤应激和焦虑症的一个挑战是在心理治疗后经常观察到的复发。复发构成了最初成功的治疗后恐惧的回归，例如，暴露于意想不到的应激源(恢复)可以触发。虽然恢复是研究焦虑相关障碍治疗后复发的一个广泛使用的模型，但在啮齿动物和人类中，它只使用直接经历的厌恶事件来描述。然而，许多恐惧和创伤是通过社会传递获得的，包含社会信息，并可能在社会情境中恢复。本项目旨在通过一种新的实验范式来研究社会对ROF的影响，该范式使用社会传递应激源(在其他人身上观察到的疼痛，而不是实际的痛感)来恢复恐惧反应。这种社会恢复使研究焦虑症相关障碍复发的生态有效社会领域成为可能，从而扩展了已建立的ROF模型。这项工作包括1)外周神经反应(皮肤电导反应，恐惧增强的惊吓)以及1)大脑反应(FMRI)的研究，以描绘社会性ROF背后的神经生物学机制。此外，翻译合作将允许将这一范例转移到啮齿动物身上。此外，2)对社会传递恐惧的首次神经心理药理学检查将使我们能够描绘社会传递恐惧的潜在传递系统的新见解。这个项目的主要目标是，由卡罗林斯卡研究所的安德烈亚斯·奥尔森博士的研究小组作为主办机构，将社会情感学习的研究与记忆形成和提取的机制联系起来。这将有助于更好地了解社会传递的恐惧和社会ROF，从而可以开发出更有效的创伤应激和焦虑症治疗方法，以防止长期复发。

A challenge in the treatment of Traumatic Stress and Anxiety disorders is the frequently observed relapse after psychological treatment. Relapse constitutes the return of fear ROF after an initially successful treatment, and can be triggered by, for example, exposure to unexpected stressor (reinstatement).Although reinstatement is a widely used model for studying the relapse after treatment of anxiety related disorders, it has been described in rodents and humans by using directly experienced aversive events exclusively. However, many fears and traumas are acquired through social transmission, contain social information, and might recover in social contexts.This project aims to investigate the social influence on ROF employing a novel experimental paradigm using a socially transmitted stressor (pain observed in others without the actual sensation of pain) to reinstate fear responses. This social reinstatement enables the investigation of the ecological valid social domain in relapse in anxiety related disorders, thus extending established models of ROF. This endeavor includes the investigation of 1a) peripheral nervous responses (skin conductance responses, fear potentiated startle) as well as 1b) brain responses (fMRI) to delineate the neurobiological mechanisms underlying social ROF. Moreover, a translational cooperation will allow a transfer of this paradigm to rodents. In addition, 2) the first neuropsychopharmacological examination of social transmitted fear will enable us to delineate novel insights in the underlying transmitter system of socially transmitted fear. The main goal of this project, with the research group of Dr. Andreas Olsson at the Karolinska Institutet as the hosting institution, is to bridge research on social affective learning with mechanisms of memory formation and retrieval. This will enable a better understanding of social transmitted fear and social ROF, which can lead to the development of more effective treatment of Traumatic Stress and Anxiety disorders to prevent relapse in the long run.