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The Efficacy of Prospective Mental Imagery in Enhancing Approach Motivation Among Socially Anxious Individuals

NCT ID: NCT06977087

Last Updated: 2025-12-23

Study Results

Results pending

The study team has not published outcome measurements, participant flow, or safety data for this trial yet. Check back later for updates.

Basic Information

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Recruitment Status

RECRUITING

Clinical Phase

NA

Total Enrollment

58 participants

Study Classification

INTERVENTIONAL

Study Start Date

2025-03-04

Study Completion Date

2026-01-31

Brief Summary

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The efficacy of an online intervention aimed at enhancing approach motivation and behavioral engagement in confronting anxiety-inducing social situations is examined among individuals with elevated social anxiety. Participants will receive psychoeducation, followed by either a prospective mental-imagery task or a verbal reasoning task. Efficacy of the intervention is measured by ratings of experienced and anticipated pleasure, approach motivation and self-reported engagement with feared situations one week later.

Detailed Description

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With numerous studies demonstrating its long-term effectiveness, exposure therapy is currently considered the leading evidence-based treatment for anxiety disorders. However, a major limitation in its application is that patients often discontinue treatment due to their unwillingness to confront themselves with the feared situation. Considering that targeting avoidance behaviors and maladaptive fear responses are at the core of exposure therapy, strategies are needed to enhance both approach motivation as well as behavioral engagement with the feared situation. Among individuals with depression, prospective mental imagery has been demonstrated to increase motivation and behavioral engagement in pleasurable activities by elevating anticipated reward as well as anticipatory and anticipated pleasure ('motivational amplifier' hypothesis). Given alterations in motivational and reward processes in individuals with social anxiety, prospective mental imagery may enhance reward anticipation and facilitate approach motivation and engagement in exposure to socially feared situations. The current online study will compare the use of a prospective mental-imagery task to an active control group (verbal reasoning) in improving approach motivation and behavioral engagement with feared situations in individuals with heightened social anxiety. Participants in both conditions will receive psychoeducation. Participants in the experimental group will vividly imagine themselves successfully mastering the feared social situation. Participants in the control condition are asked to reflect on the pros and cons of confronting themselves with the feared social situation. Approach motivation as well as reward anticipation, anticipated and anticipatory pleasure will be assessed before and after the imagery or verbal reasoning task. Engagement with the feared social situation will be assessed one week later. Aim of the randomized controlled trial is to investigate whether prospective mental imagery is effective in enhancing self-reported motivation and engagement with feared situations compared to an active control group. In an exploratory analysis, we will examine whether the efficacy of the prospective imagery training is modulated by individuals' levels of reward sensitivity and anhedonia.

Conditions

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Social Anxiety Social Phobia

Study Design

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Allocation Method

RANDOMIZED

Intervention Model

PARALLEL

Primary Study Purpose

TREATMENT

Blinding Strategy

SINGLE

Participants

Study Groups

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Psychoeducation + Prospective Mental-Imagery Task

Prospective mental imagery of post-exposure experience

Group Type EXPERIMENTAL

Psychoeducation

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Providing information about social anxiety, role of safety and avoidance behaviors in maintaining social anxiety, rationale for exposure to feared social situations

Prospective Mental Imagery

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

A standard imagination script is recounted in which participants have successfully mastered the socially feared situation

Psychoeducation + Verbal Reasoning Task

Verbal reasoning of pro and cons of exposure

Group Type ACTIVE_COMPARATOR

Psychoeducation

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Providing information about social anxiety, role of safety and avoidance behaviors in maintaining social anxiety, rationale for exposure to feared social situations

Verbal Reasoning

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Participants are asked to reflect on the pros and cons of facing the socially feared situation

Interventions

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Psychoeducation

Providing information about social anxiety, role of safety and avoidance behaviors in maintaining social anxiety, rationale for exposure to feared social situations

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Prospective Mental Imagery

A standard imagination script is recounted in which participants have successfully mastered the socially feared situation

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Verbal Reasoning

Participants are asked to reflect on the pros and cons of facing the socially feared situation

Intervention Type BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

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Inclusion Criteria

* Elevated score on Mini-Social Phobia Inventory (Mini-SPIN) \> 6
* Moderate fear and avoidance of two specified social situations (i.e., giving a stranger a compliment and asking for a restaurant recommendation), each rated above 5 on a Likert scale ranging from 0 (not at all) to 10 (extremely), respectively
* Avoidance of the two specified social situations (i.e., giving a stranger a compliment and asking for a restaurant recommendation), indicated by not having engaged in either behaviors in the past 7 days
Minimum Eligible Age

18 Years

Eligible Sex

ALL

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Sponsors

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Philipps University Marburg

OTHER

Sponsor Role lead

Responsible Party

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Responsibility Role SPONSOR

Locations

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Germany Philipps University

Marburg, , Germany

Site Status RECRUITING

Countries

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Germany

Central Contacts

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Andrea Stoliarov, M.Sc.

Role: CONTACT

Phone: +4964212826991

Email: [email protected]

Christoph Benke, PhD

Role: CONTACT

Phone: +4964212824091

Email: [email protected]

Facility Contacts

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Christoph Benke, PhD

Role: primary

Andrea Stoliarov, M.Sc.

Role: backup

References

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Hallford DJ, Farrell H, Lynch E. Increasing anticipated and anticipatory pleasure through episodic thinking. Emotion. 2022 Jun;22(4):690-700. doi: 10.1037/emo0000765. Epub 2020 Jun 18.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 32551746 (View on PubMed)

Renner F, Werthmann J, Paetsch A, Bar HE, Heise M, Bruijniks SJE. Prospective Mental Imagery in Depression: Impact on Reward Processing and Reward-Motivated Behaviour. Clin Psychol Eur. 2021 Jun 18;3(2):e3013. doi: 10.32872/cpe.3013. eCollection 2021 Jun.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 36397959 (View on PubMed)

Renner F, Murphy FC, Ji JL, Manly T, Holmes EA. Mental imagery as a "motivational amplifier" to promote activities. Behav Res Ther. 2019 Mar;114:51-59. doi: 10.1016/j.brat.2019.02.002. Epub 2019 Feb 5.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 30797989 (View on PubMed)

Ji JL, Geiles D, Saulsman LM. Mental imagery-based episodic simulation amplifies motivation and behavioural engagement in planned reward activities. Behav Res Ther. 2021 Oct;145:103947. doi: 10.1016/j.brat.2021.103947. Epub 2021 Aug 15.

Reference Type BACKGROUND
PMID: 34433114 (View on PubMed)

Other Identifiers

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Trau dich! 2.0

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id