Trial reportBiological psychiatry2011
Acute hydrocortisone treatment increases anxiety but not fear in healthy volunteers: a fear-potentiated startle study.
Trial report in Biological psychiatry, 2011. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 28 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
28 citing papers in PubMed, 38 citations in OpenAlex.
- Neurophysiological and clinical effects of the NMDA receptor antagonist lanicemine (BHV-5500) in PTSD: A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial.Depression and anxiety · 2021Trial
- The novel vasopressin receptor (V1aR) antagonist SRX246 reduces anxiety in an experimental model in humans: a randomized proof-of-concept study.Psychopharmacology · 2021Trial
- The CRH1 antagonist GSK561679 increases human fear but not anxiety as assessed by startle.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2015Trial
- Acute tryptophan depletion increases translational indices of anxiety but not fear: serotonergic modulation of the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis?Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2012Trial
- Anxiety and Depression Traits Are Moderated by a Sex-Dependent Genetic Interaction Between 5-HTTLPR and BDNF.Brain sciences · 2026Article
- Longitudinal associations between binge drinking and changes in behavioral and neural threat reactivity in youth.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2026Article
- Activity of Corticotropin-Releasing Factor Neurons in the Bed Nucleus of the Stria Terminalis Reduces Anxiety-Potentiated Startle in Female Rats in an Estrous Phase-Dependent Manner.Biological psychiatry · 2026Article
- Impact of behavioral inhibitory control and startle reactivity to uncertain threat on youth suicide risk.Psychophysiology · 2025Article
- Enduring impact of childhood adversity: Affective modulation of acoustic startle response during pregnancy and postpartum.Physiology & behavior · 2023Article
- Threat effects on attention networks in individuals with a history of externalizing behaviors.International journal of psychophysiology : official journal of the International Organization of Psychophysiology · 2023Article
- Imaging the cerebellum in post-traumatic stress and anxiety disorders: a mini-review.Frontiers in systems neuroscience · 2023Review
- A midbrain-reticulotegmental circuit underlies exaggerated startle under fear emotions.Molecular psychiatry · 2022Article
- Glucocorticoid-immune response to acute stress in women and men living with HIV.Journal of behavioral medicine · 2019Article
- Neural correlates of predictable and unpredictable threat in internalizing psychopathology.Neuroscience letters · 2019Article
- A Proof-of-Mechanism Study to Test Effects of the NMDA Receptor Antagonist Lanicemine on Behavioral Sensitization in Individuals With Symptoms of PTSD.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2019Article
- Exercise decreases defensive responses to unpredictable, but not predictable, threat.Depression and anxiety · 2018Article
- Probing for Neuroadaptations to Unpredictable Stressors in Addiction: Translational Methods and Emerging Evidence.Journal of studies on alcohol and drugs · 2017Review
- Association between problematic alcohol use and reactivity to uncertain threat in two independent samples.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2016Article
- Fear potentiated startle increases phospholipase D (PLD) expression/activity and PLD-linked metabotropic glutamate receptor mediated post-tetanic potentiation in rat amygdala.Neurobiology of learning and memory · 2016Article
- Dissociated neural effects of cortisol depending on threat escapability.Human brain mapping · 2015Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundThe debilitating effects of chronic glucocorticoids excess are well-known, but comparatively little is understood about the role of acute cortisol. Indirect evidence in rodents suggests that acute cortisone could selectively increase some forms of long-duration aversive states, such as "anxiety," but not relatively similar, briefer aversive states, such as "fear." However, no prior experimental studies in humans consider the unique effects of cortisol on anxiety and fear, using well-validated methods for eliciting these two similar but dissociable aversive states. The current study examines these effects, as instantiated with short- and long-duration threats.
methodsHealthy volunteers (n = 18) received placebo or a low (20 mg) or a high (60 mg) dose of hydrocortisone in a double-blind crossover design. Subjects were exposed repeatedly to three 150-sec duration conditions: no shock; predictable shocks, in which shocks were signaled by a short-duration threat cue; and unpredictable shocks. Aversive states were indexed by acoustic startle. Fear was operationally defined as the increase in startle reactivity during the threat cue in the predictable condition (fear-potentiated startle). Anxiety was operationally defined as the increase in baseline startle from the no shock to the two threat conditions (anxiety-potentiated startle).
resultsHydrocortisone affected neither baseline nor short-duration, fear-potentiated startle but increased long-duration anxiety-potentiated startle.
conclusionsThese results suggest that hydrocortisone administration in humans selectively increases anxiety but not fear. Possible mechanisms implicated are discussed in light of prior data in rodents. Specifically, hydrocortisone might increase anxiety via sensitization of corticotrophin-releasing hormones in the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.