Research article summary:

Pharmacology of human experimental anxiety.

Abstract Extract:
This review covers the effect of drugs affecting anxiety using four psychological procedures for inducing experimental anxiety applied to healthy volunteers and patients with anxiety disorders. The first is aversive conditioning of the skin conductance ... (Full abstract text below)

Published 2003Apr in Journal: Braz J Med Biol Res (Language : eng)

Full Pubmed Extract

This information was retrieved, real-time, on your behalf from the public area of the Pubmed website:

1. Braz J Med Biol Res. 2003 Apr;36(4):421-32

Pharmacology of human experimental anxiety.

Graeff FG, Parente A, Del-Ben CM, Guimarães FS

Departamento de Neurologia, Psiquiatria e Psicologia Médica, Faculdade de Medicina de Ribeirão Preto, Universidade de São Paulo, Ribeirão Preto, SP, Brasil. fgraeff@keynet.com.br

This review covers the effect of drugs affecting anxiety using four psychological procedures for inducing experimental anxiety applied to healthy volunteers and patients with anxiety disorders. The first is aversive conditioning of the skin conductance responses to tones. The second is simulated public speaking, which consists of speaking in front of a video camera, with anxiety being measured with psychometric scales. The third is the Stroop Color-Word test, in which words naming colors are painted in the same or in a different shade, the incongruence generating a cognitive conflict. The last test is a human version of a thoroughly studied animal model of anxiety, fear-potentiated startle, in which the eye-blink reflex to a loud noise is recorded. The evidence reviewed led to the conclusion that the aversive conditioning and potentiated startle tests are based on classical conditioning of anticipatory anxiety. Their sensitivity to benzodiazepine anxiolytics suggests that these models generate an emotional state related to generalized anxiety disorder. On the other hand, the increase in anxiety determined by simulated public speaking is resistant to benzodiazepines and sensitive to drugs affecting serotonergic neurotransmission. This pharmacological profile, together with epidemiological evidence indicating its widespread prevalence, suggests that the emotional state generated by public speaking represents a species-specific response that may be related to social phobia and panic disorder. Because of scant pharmacological data, the status of the Stroop Color-Word test remains uncertain. In spite of ethical and economic constraints, human experimental anxiety constitutes a valuable tool for the study of the pathophysiology of anxiety disorders.

PMID : 12700819 [PubMed - Indexed for MEDLINE]

This information is obtained from the National Library of Medicine (NLM). Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright. Type "NLM copyright" into Google for more information.

Full Author Information

First Name	LastName	Initials
F G	Graeff	FG
A	Parente	A
C M	Del-Ben	CM
F S	Guimarães	FS

Affiliation: Departamento de Neurologia, Psiquiatria e Psicologia Médica, Faculdade de Medicina de Ribeirão Preto, Universidade de São Paulo, Ribeirão Preto, SP, Brasil. fgraeff@keynet.com.br

3rd Party provider links

Click the links below to go to related 3rd party information:

MESH categories and related page links

This article was linked to the MESH categories shown on the left below. The links on the right are related Memletics pages.

Links for this article

For links to places where you can get the full text of this article see links. Note there may be a subscription or fee required for access to the full text.

New! Using similar technology to this site, we have launched find-health-articles.com, targeting over 1 million health research article abstracts.

Here are some articles related to this one (by title keywords):

The effects of deep diaphragmatic breathing and focused attention on dental anxiety in a private practice setting.

Contrasting two accounts of anxiety-linked attentional bias: selective attention to varying levels of stimulus threat intensity.

Biomarkers for the effects of benzodiazepines in healthy volunteers.

Symptoms of anxiety disorders and teacher-reported school functioning of normal children.

Improving homework compliance in the treatment of generalized anxiety disorder.

Identity and expression memory for happy and angry faces in social anxiety.

Heavy drinking among college students is influenced by anxiety sensitivity, gender, and contexts for alcohol use.

A general anxiety-prone cognitive style in anxiety disorders.

Factorial structure of the revised mathematics anxiety rating scale for undergraduate education majors.

Facial expression recognition in adolescents with mood and anxiety disorders.

>>> Get more research article abstracts like these, or browse abstracts.

Keywords in this article:

affecting, animal, anticipatory, anxiety, anxiolytics, applied, aversive, based, benzodiazepine, benzodiazepines, blink, camera, classical, cognitive, color, colors, conclusion, conditioning, conductance, conflict, consists, constitutes, constraints, covers, data, determined, different, disorders, drugs, economic, effect, emotional, epidemiological, ethical, evidence, experimental, eye, fear, first, four, front, generalized, generate, generated, generating, hand, healthy, human, incongruence, increase, indicating, inducing, last, led, loud, measured, model, models, naming, neurotransmission, noise, other, painted, panic, pathophysiology, patients, pharmacological, phobia, potentiated, prevalence, procedures, profile, psychological, psychometric, public, recorded, reflex, related, remains, represents, resistant, responses, review, reviewed, same, scales, scant, second, sensitive, sensitivity, serotonergic, shade, simulated, skin, social, speaking, species, specific, spite, startle, state, status, stroop, studied, study, suggests, test, tests, third, thoroughly, together, tones, tool, uncertain, valuable, version, video, volunteers, widespread, word, words

Also, see our new free speed reading online course (beta version)