In this study, brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) heterozygous knock-outs were tested on fear conditioning, and their wild-type littermates were used as controls. Results showed that BDNF(+/-) mice are impaired in contextual learning, whereas tone learning remains intact. Because BDNF is involved in synaptic transmission and contextual learning is hippocampal dependent, we hypothesized th...

OBJECTIVE The objective of this study was to analyze the autonomic functions of patients with erythrophobia. METHODS Forty patients with a diagnosis of erythrophobia (female/male ratio 18/22) without any other organic lesions and 20 healthy volunteers (female/male ratio 10/10) were assessed. Clinical evaluation was performed using a modified version of semistructured interviews. Autonomic tes...

Introduction: Effective perception of fear signals is crucial for organism survival. When threated, the organism indicates defensive behaviors. Methods: Elevated plus–maze has high efficiency for measurement of fear behavior and is widly used for fear behavior determination. Increase in two parameters percent of openarm entries (%OAE) and percent of time spent in the open-arm (%OAT) in the ...

Introduction: Surgery and anesthesia are the common practice for anesthetist on the one hand and very worrying for the patient and his family on the other. This fear can have potentially dangerous consequences. The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between the awareness and fear of patients and their companions towards anesthesia. Methods: The present study employed a descrip...

Around 75% of civilians have experienced at least one traumatic event in their lives, and this number is considerably higher in many parts of the world, as well as in military veterans and first responders. Of those exposed to trauma, 15-25% will develop Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).  PTSD extracts enormous economic, health, and quality of life cost. Thus, it is critical to underst...

Distance perception is among the most pervasive mental phenomena and the oldest research topics in behavioural science. However, we do not understand well the most pervasive finding of distance perception research, that of large individual differences. There are large individual differences in acrophobia (fear of heights), which we commonly assume consists of an abnormal fear of stimuli perceiv...

Introduction: The Frailty Syndrome is not synonymous with disability, but may be a precursor of etiological and physiological dysfunction, which affects mobility before causing reduced functional capacity, explaining conditions of weakness, weight loss, and abnormal gait. Study design: This is an analytical, observational, cross-sectional study. Objective: To verify the association of handgrip ...

The brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) is critically involved in neuroplasticity, as well as the acquisition, consolidation, and retention of hippocampal- and amygdala-dependent learning. A common functional A-->G single nucleotide polymorphism (BDNFval66met) in the prodomain of the human BDNF gene is associated with abnormal intracellular trafficking and reduced activity-dependent BDNF r...

Fear of childbirth is an important and prevalent problem during pregnancy and delivery. Self-efficacy of childbirth is one of the factors playing an important role in the fear of delivery. This study aimed to determine the relationship between the fear and self-efficacy of childbirth during labor in primipara women. This descriptive and analytical study was conducted on 100 primipara women in O...