title: Effects of conditioned stimulus pre-exposure on human electrodermal conditioning to fear-relevant and fear-irrelevant stimuli.
abstract: The effects of conditioned stimulus (CS) pre-exposure and fear-relevance of the CS on human Pavlovian electrodermal conditioning were investigated. A differential delayed conditioning paradigm was used with a CS-unconditioned stimulus (US; shock) interval of 8 s. In Experiment 1, 64 subjects were randomized into four groups, two of which received fear-relevant stimuli and the other two fear-irrelevant stimuli. Half of the subjects were pre-exposed to the to-be-CSs and the other half to two not-to-be-CSs, with 15 exposure of each stimulus. During acquisition, subjects received 8 reinforced and 8 nonreinforced CS+ and CS- trials, and during the extinction phase 15 nonreinforced trials of each CS. Pre-exposure to the to-be-CSs retarded conditioning for the first and second interval anticipatory responses (FIRs and SIRs); that is, a latent inhibition effect was demonstrated, although the results for the FIR were inconclusive. The expected effects of fear-relevance were not revealed. Experiment 2 addressed the question whether the long pre-exposure period interfered with the frequently observed "preparedness effect" of higher resistance to extinction to fear-relevant stimuli. The design was similar to that of Experiment 1, but for half of the subjects the acquisition phase was initiated immediately after a short rest period, and for the other half acquisition started after an extended rest period, equal to the duration of the pre-exposure phase in Experiment 1. Twenty extinction trials of each CS were presented. A reliable difference in arousal in terms of spontaneous fluctuations was produced by the rest periods, but although differential conditioning was observed, no effect of fear-relevance was seen during extinction.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, University College of Orebro, Sweden.
authors.forename: P A
authors.initials: PA
authors.lastname: Björkstrand
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001143:Arousal; D001288:Attention; D003214:Conditioning, Classical; D005108:Extinction, Psychological; D005239:Fear; D005260:Female; D005712:Galvanic Skin Response; D006801:Humans; D007266:Inhibition, Psychological; D008297:Male