SynthesisNeuroscience and biobehavioral reviews2021
Fear conditioning and extinction in obsessive-compulsive disorder: A systematic review.
Synthesis in Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 34 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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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.
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Who cites it
34 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Fears Worth Testing Out: A Systematic Review of the Neural Mechanisms of Treatment Outcome for Anxiety-Related Disorders.Current topics in behavioral neurosciences · 2025Pooled it
- A meta-analysis of conditioned fear generalization in anxiety-related disorders.Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology · 2022Pooled it
- Frontopolar multifocal transcranial direct current stimulation reduces conditioned fear reactivity during extinction training: A pilot randomized controlled trial.Neurobiology of learning and memory · 2023Trial
- Resolving temporal threat uncertainty by observational learning involves the amygdala, hippocampus and anterior insula.Translational psychiatry · 2026Article
- Autonomic Dysregulation in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: Simultaneous Assessment of Electrodermal, Cardiac, and Oculomotor Responses to Triggering Videos-An Exploratory Study.Brain sciences · 2026Article
- Preliminary examination of disgust learning as a potential OCD endophenotype.Journal of affective disorders · 2026Article
- Heightened Distraction under Competition in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Are Fear Learning Processes Altered in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Social Anxiety, and Specific Phobia? Insights From the Late Positive Potential, Fear-Potentiated Startle, and Ratings.Psychophysiology · 2026Article
- Emotional learning selectively distorts the temporal organization of memory: A quantitative synthesis.Cognition · 2026Article
- Altered Striatal Functional Gradients in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.Biological psychiatry. Cognitive neuroscience and neuroimaging · 2025Article
- Encoding-Retrieval Similarity Reveals Distinct Neural Reinstatement of Safety Memories Following Counterconditioning in Posttraumatic Stress Disorder.Biological psychiatry. Cognitive neuroscience and neuroimaging · 2025Article
- Neural correlates of human fear conditioning and sources of variability in 2199 individuals.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Altered striatal functional gradients in obsessive-compulsive disorder.medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences · 2025Article
- Intergenerational Effects of Stress - A Focus on Learning and Memory.Current topics in behavioral neurosciences · 2025Review
- Investigating the effect of continuous and partial reinforcement in conceptual fear generalization.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Semantic structures facilitate threat memory integration throughout the medial temporal lobe and medial prefrontal cortex.Current biology : CB · 2024Article
- Understanding Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Psychosis Through the Predictive Coding Framework.Biological psychiatry global open science · 2024Review
- Adolescents flexibly adapt action selection based on controllability inferences.Learning & memory (Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y.) · 2024Article
- Genetic differences associated with dopamine and serotonin release mediate fear-induced bradycardia in the human brain.Translational psychiatry · 2024Review
- Cognitive inflexibility, obsessive-compulsive symptoms and traits and poor post-pandemic adjustment.Neuroscience applied · 2024Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
2 authors.
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Abstract
Laboratory experiments using fear conditioning and extinction protocols help lay the groundwork for designing, testing, and optimizing innovative treatments for anxiety-related disorders. Yet, there is limited basic research on fear conditioning and extinction in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). This is surprising because exposure-based treatments based on associative learning principles are among the most popular and effective treatment options for OCD. Here, we systematically review and critically assess existing aversive conditioning and extinction studies of OCD. Across 12 studies, there was moderate evidence that OCD is associated with abnormal acquisition of conditioned responses that differ from comparison groups. There was relatively stronger evidence of OCD's association with impaired extinction processes. This included multiple studies finding elevated conditioned responses during extinction learning and poorer threat/safety discrimination during recall, although a minority of studies yielded results inconsistent with this conclusion. Overall, the conditioning model holds value for OCD research, but more work is necessary to clarify emerging patterns of results and increase clinical translational utility to the level seen in other anxiety-related disorders. We detail limitations in the literature and suggest next steps, including modeling OCD with more complex conditioning methodology (e.g., semantic/conceptual generalization, avoidance) and improving individual-differences assessment with dimensional techniques.
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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.