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Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer after human threat conditioning

Threat conditioning is a common associative learning model with translational relevance. How threat-conditioned cues impact on formally unrelated instrumental behavior in humans is not well known. Such an effect is known as Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer (PIT). While PIT with aversive primary Pa...

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Autores principales: Xia, Yanfang, Gurkina, Angelina, Bach, Dominik R.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6478249/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31004041
http://dx.doi.org/10.1101/lm.049338.119
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author Xia, Yanfang
Gurkina, Angelina
Bach, Dominik R.
author_facet Xia, Yanfang
Gurkina, Angelina
Bach, Dominik R.
author_sort Xia, Yanfang
collection PubMed
description Threat conditioning is a common associative learning model with translational relevance. How threat-conditioned cues impact on formally unrelated instrumental behavior in humans is not well known. Such an effect is known as Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer (PIT). While PIT with aversive primary Pavlovian reinforcers is established in nonhuman animals, this is less clear in humans, where secondary reinforcers or instructed instrumental responses are most often investigated. We modified an existing human PIT procedure to include primary reinforcers. Participants first learned to obtain (or avoid losing) appetitive instrumental reinforcement (chocolate) by appropriate approach or avoidance actions. They either had to act (Go) or to withhold an action (NoGo), and in the Go condition either to approach a reward target to collect it or to withdraw from the reward target to avoid losing it. Then they learned to associate screen color (CS) with aversive Pavlovian reinforcement (electric shock US). In the transfer phase, we conducted the instrumental task during the presence of Pavlovian CS. In a first experiment, we show that the aversive Pavlovian CS+, compared to CS−, increased response rate in Go-Withdraw trials, i.e., induce conditioned facilitation of avoidance responses. This finding was confirmed in a second and independent experiment with an increased number of Go-Withdraw trials. Notably, we observed no appreciable conditioned suppression of approach responses. Effect size to distinguish CS+/CS− in Go-Withdraw trials was d = 0.42 in the confirmation sample. This would require n = 37 participants to demonstrate threat learning with 80% power. Thus, the effect size is on a practically useful scale although smaller than for model-based analysis of autonomic measures. In summary, our results indicate conditioned facilitation of formally unrelated instrumental avoidance behavior in humans and provide a novel behavioral threat learning measure that requires only key presses.
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spelling pubmed-64782492019-05-16 Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer after human threat conditioning Xia, Yanfang Gurkina, Angelina Bach, Dominik R. Learn Mem Research Threat conditioning is a common associative learning model with translational relevance. How threat-conditioned cues impact on formally unrelated instrumental behavior in humans is not well known. Such an effect is known as Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer (PIT). While PIT with aversive primary Pavlovian reinforcers is established in nonhuman animals, this is less clear in humans, where secondary reinforcers or instructed instrumental responses are most often investigated. We modified an existing human PIT procedure to include primary reinforcers. Participants first learned to obtain (or avoid losing) appetitive instrumental reinforcement (chocolate) by appropriate approach or avoidance actions. They either had to act (Go) or to withhold an action (NoGo), and in the Go condition either to approach a reward target to collect it or to withdraw from the reward target to avoid losing it. Then they learned to associate screen color (CS) with aversive Pavlovian reinforcement (electric shock US). In the transfer phase, we conducted the instrumental task during the presence of Pavlovian CS. In a first experiment, we show that the aversive Pavlovian CS+, compared to CS−, increased response rate in Go-Withdraw trials, i.e., induce conditioned facilitation of avoidance responses. This finding was confirmed in a second and independent experiment with an increased number of Go-Withdraw trials. Notably, we observed no appreciable conditioned suppression of approach responses. Effect size to distinguish CS+/CS− in Go-Withdraw trials was d = 0.42 in the confirmation sample. This would require n = 37 participants to demonstrate threat learning with 80% power. Thus, the effect size is on a practically useful scale although smaller than for model-based analysis of autonomic measures. In summary, our results indicate conditioned facilitation of formally unrelated instrumental avoidance behavior in humans and provide a novel behavioral threat learning measure that requires only key presses. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press 2019-05 /pmc/articles/PMC6478249/ /pubmed/31004041 http://dx.doi.org/10.1101/lm.049338.119 Text en © 2019 Xia et al.; Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This article, published in Learning & Memory, is available under a Creative Commons License (Attribution 4.0 International), as described at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Research
Xia, Yanfang
Gurkina, Angelina
Bach, Dominik R.
Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer after human threat conditioning
title Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer after human threat conditioning
title_full Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer after human threat conditioning
title_fullStr Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer after human threat conditioning
title_full_unstemmed Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer after human threat conditioning
title_short Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer after human threat conditioning
title_sort pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer after human threat conditioning
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6478249/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31004041
http://dx.doi.org/10.1101/lm.049338.119
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