Social modulation in extinction of aversive memories

Return of fear after extinction is a considerable challenge for the efficacy of exposure-based therapies. Fear recovery is most often modeled in the laboratory by changing the experimental context and studied in isolated animals. Since social context is an important factor affecting behavior, the question arises how it influences the recovery of extinguished fear. Here we present two novel behavioral models that allow studying social modulation of extinction memory retrieval. We show that the presence of a fearful cage mate results in a robust renewal of freezing as well as avoidance responses that were previously successfully extinguished.

► We propose two models of social modulation of extinction memory retrieval.
► Extinguished fear response renews in the presence of a fearful conspecific.
► Extinguished avoidance response renews in the presence of a fearful conspecific.