Can You 'Unlearn" Fear -- and Why You Might Want to

I don't know about you but I kind of like my imagination.  Of course, it's something that's needed in my profession, as a writer.   I'd be pretty dead meat without it.

But now a new study says that it might be just as good for helping us with a certain trait we may not like.

According to newswise.com, “This research confirms that imagination is a neurological reality that can have an impact our brains and bodies in ways that matter for our well-being,” says Tor Wager, director of the Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Laboratory at CU Boulder and co-senior author of the paper.

About one in three people in the United States have anxiety disorders, including phobias, and 8 percent have post-traumatic stress disorder. Since the 1950s, clinicians have used “exposure therapy” as a first-line treatment, asking patients to face their fears—real or imagined—in a safe, controlled setting. Anecdotally, results have been positive, newswise notes.

But until now, very little has been known about how such methods affect the brain or how imagination neurologically compares to real-life exposure, the Web site reports.

“This is the first neuroscience study to show that imagining a threat can actually alter the way it is represented in the brain," says Marianne Cumella Reddan, a graduate student in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience at CU Boulder, at the site.

For the study, 68 healthy participants were trained to associate a sound with an uncomfortable, but not painful, electric shock, according to newswise. Then they were divided into three groups and either exposed to the same threatening sound, asked to “play the sound in their head,” or asked to imagine pleasant bird and rain sounds—all without experiencing further shocks.

The researchers measured brain activity using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Sensors on the skin measured how the body responded.

In the groups that imagined and heard the threatening sounds, brain activity was remarkably similar, with the auditory cortex (which processes sound), the nucleus accumbens (which is associated with reward learning) and the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (associated with risk and aversion) all lighting up.

After repeated exposure without the accompanying shock, the subjects in both the real and imagined threat groups experienced what is known as “extinction,” where the formerly fear-inducing stimulus no longer ignited a fear response.

Essentially, the brain had unlearned to be afraid.

“Statistically, real and imagined exposure to the threat were not different at the whole brain level, and imagination worked just as well,” said Reddan.

Notably, the group that imagined birds and rain sounds showed different brain reactions, and their fear response to the sound persisted.

“I think a lot of people assume that the way to reduce fear or negative emotion is to imagine something good. In fact, what might be more effective is exactly the opposite: imagining the threat, but without the negative consequences,” said Wager.

Previous research has shown that imagining an act can activate and strengthen regions of the brain involved in its real-life execution, improving performance. For instance, imagining playing piano can boost neuronal connections in regions related to the fingers. Research also shows it’s possible to update our memories, inserting new details.

The new study suggests that imagination may be a more powerful tool than previously believed for updating those memories. 

“If you have a memory that is no longer useful for you or is crippling you, you can use imagination to tap into it, change it and re-consolidate it, updating the way you think about and experience something,” concludes Reddan, stressing that something as simple as imagining a single tone tapped into a complex network of brain circuits.