A phobia is an excessive fear of an object or fearful situation. The corticosteroids, cortisol or cortisone (stress hormones), are released during fearful situations. Previous findings suggest that high levels of cortisol or cortisone may inhibit fearful memories. Now research reports that cortisol may help calm phobias.
The study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, investigated whether corticosteroid treatment reduces phobic fear in two groups of people with social or spider phobias. Researchers at the University of Zurich in Switzerland, administered 25 milligrams of cortisone or a placebo to 40 participants with social phobia one hour before public speaking. The participants wore heart rate monitors and self-rated their fear.
For the spider phobia group, researchers administered 10 milligrams of cortisol or a placebo to 10 participants with spider phobias one hour before exposure to a spider photograph. This was repeated six times. Cortisol was not administered for the first and last spider photograph exposures. The participants self-rated their fear.
Researchers found that heart rates significantly increased for the social phobia placebo group, as compared to the cortisol group. Furthermore, the social phobia cortisol group reported less fear than the placebo group. Findings also revealed that the spider phobia cortisol group reported less fear with each exposure to the spider photograph, than the placebo group. Less fear was reported after the last photograph exposure, two days after the last cortisol treatment.
The results suggest that cortisol treatment helped control the phobias. "Cortisol treatment did not reduce general, phobia-unrelated anxiety." the study authors write. "In conclusion, the present findings in two distinct types of phobias indicate that glucocorticoid administration reduces phobic fear."
REFERENCES:
1. Soravia LM et al. Glucocorticoids reduce phobic fear in humans. PNAS 2006 Apr4;103(14):5585-5590.
Posted by Elaine Gavalas on July 26, 2006 02:08 PM
