Highlights
- •A threatening social context facilitates differential acquisition of pain-related fear.
- •The facilitation is evident in self-report and psychophysiological indices of fear.
- •A threatening social context leads to contextual fear.
- •Social context does not affect pain intensity ratings.
Abstract
This study investigated the effects of a threatening and a safe social context on
learning pain-related fear, a key factor in the development and maintenance of chronic
pain. We measured self-reported pain intensity, pain expectancy, pain-related fear
(verbal ratings and eyeblink startle responses), and behavioral measures of avoidance
(movement-onset latency and duration) using an established differential voluntary
movement fear conditioning paradigm. Participants (N = 42) performed different movements
with a joystick: during fear acquisition, movement in one direction (CS+) was followed
by a painful stimulus (pain-US) whereas movement in another direction (CS–) was not.
For participants in the threat group, an angry face was continuously presented in the background during the task,
whereas in the safe group, a happy face was presented. During the extinction phase the pain-US was omitted.
As compared to the safe social context, a threatening social context led to increased
contextual fear and facilitated differentiation between CS+ and CS– movements regarding
self-reported pain expectancy, fear of pain, eyeblink startle responses, and movement-onset
latency. In contrast, self-reported pain intensity was not affected by social context.
These data support the modulation of pain-related fear by social context.
Perspective
A threatening social context leads to stronger acquisition of (pain-related) fear
and simultaneous contextual fear but does not affect pain intensity ratings. This
knowledge may aid in the prevention of chronic pain and anxiety disorders and shows
that social context might modulate pain-related fear without immediately affecting
pain intensity itself.
Key words
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: December 12, 2014
Accepted:
November 22,
2014
Received in revised form:
November 17,
2014
Received:
September 10,
2014
Footnotes
Development of the MacBrain Face Stimulus Set (Fig 1) was overseen by Nim Tottenham and supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Early Experience and Brain Development. Please contact Nim Tottenham at [email protected] for more information concerning the stimulus set.
This study was supported by the Odysseus Grant ‘The Psychology of Pain and Disability Research Program’ funded by the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO Vlaanderen), Belgium, granted to J.W.S.V. (grant ID = G090208N), and an EFIC-Grünenthal Research Grant (E-G-G ID: 169518451) to A.M. In addition, A.M. is a postdoctoral researcher in FWO Vlaanderen, Flanders, Belgium (grant ID = 12E3714 N).
The authors report no conflicts of interest.
Identification
Copyright
© 2015 American Pain Society. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
