Learned together, extinguished apart: reducing fear to complex stimuli.
Pairing a previously neutral conditioned stimulus (CS; e.g., a tone) to an aversive unconditioned stimulus (US; e.g., a footshock) leads to associative learning such that the tone alone comes to elicit a conditioned response (e.g., freezing). We have previously shown that an extinction session that occurs within the reconsolidation window attenuates fear responding and prevents the return of fear in pure tone Pavlovian fear conditioning. Here we sought to examine whether this effect also applies to a more complex fear memory. First, we show that after fear conditioning to the simultaneous presentation of a tone and a light (T+L) coterminating with a shock, the compound memory that ensues is more resistant to fear extinction than simple tone-shock pairings. Next, we demonstrate that the compound memory can be disrupted by interrupting the reconsolidation of the two individual components using a sequential retrieval+extinction paradigm, provided the stronger compound component is retrieved first. These findings provide insight into how compound memories are encoded, and could have important implications for PTSD treatment.
Department of Psychology, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712, USA.
Carolyn E
CE
Jones
Stephanie
S
Ringuet
Marie-H
MH
Monfils
D000161:Acoustic Stimulation / Q000009:adverse effects; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D000818:Animals; D001921:Brain / Q000378:metabolism; D003214:Conditioning, Classical / Q000502:physiology*; D003463:Cues; D005108:Extinction, Psychological / Q000502:physiology*; D005239:Fear; D046352:Freezing Reaction, Cataleptic; D008297:Male; D057567:Memory, Long-Term / Q000502:physiology*; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000009:adverse effects; D016760:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-fos / Q000378:metabolism; D011601:Psychophysics; D051381:Rats; D017207:Rats, Sprague-Dawley; D012691:Serial Learning / Q000502:physiology; D013997:Time Factors
D016760:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-fos