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A Novel Conditioning Approach to Counter Loneliness in Adults
Sponsor: Education University of Hong Kong
Summary
This study aims to test the efficacy of a 6-session conditioning paradigm by investigating the conditioning-induced change in the socio-affective processing, loneliness, depressive symptoms, and neural correlates of lonely adults.
Key Details
Gender
All
Age Range
18 Years - Any
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Enrollment
136
Start Date
2025-08-19
Completion Date
2026-06
Last Updated
2026-03-02
Healthy Volunteers
Yes
Conditions
Interventions
Evaluative Conditioning with positive stimuli
In the pre-conditioning phase, participants will be exposed to pictures that vary in their emotional (negative, positive) and social (non-social, social) content. For each picture, they are required to indicate their immediate perceived valence (between negative to positive), degree of social motivation (between none to high) on Likert-scales. In the conditioning phase, emotional social pictures will be selected and paired with non-social positive stimuli for trials in random order, for 6 sessions across 3 weeks. In the post-conditioning phase, participants will be asked to evaluate the valence of the stimuli again similar to that in pre-conditioning phase.
Conditioning with neutral stimuli
In the pre-conditioning phase, participants will be exposed to pictures that vary in their emotional (negative, positive) and social (non-social, social) content. For each picture, they are required to indicate their immediate perceived valence (between negative to positive), degree of social motivation (between none to high) on Likert-scales. In the conditioning phase, emotional social pictures will be selected and paired with with neutral non-social stimuli for trials in random order, for 6 sessions across 3 weeks. In the post-conditioning phase, participants will be asked to evaluate the valence of the stimuli again similar to that in pre-conditioning phase.
Locations (1)
The University of Hong Kong
Hong Kong, Hong Kong