Use of Pseudodesensitization in Treatment of an Experimentally Produced Fear
By creating a conditioned fear in the laboratory and using the galvanic skin resistance (GSR) to monitor this fear, it was possible to assess the effectiveness of placebo treatment for reducing a conditioned fear. 10 subjects were classically conditioned to fear a specific signal light. Five of them were treated for the fear with a pseudodesensitization treatment; the others were not. The pseudodesensitization group extinguished the conditioned fear significantly faster than the control group.