We particularly thank Dr. Stefan Tsch&#246;ke and Luisa Steib for scientific advice and assistance with the recruitment of clinical participants, as well as all participants who enabled us to conduct the study and learn from them.

Our study was approved by the Ethical Committee at the Ulm University. All investigation proceedings were non-invasive and conducted in accordance with the guidelines for good clinical practice and the Declaration of Helsinki.
1. General procedures for the preparation of the psychophysiological experiment
<ol>
	<li>Obtain ethical approval for the protocol and written informed consent from all participants after giving them detailed information (including information about the possibility of earlier termination without any negative consequences).</li>
	<li>Prepare the introductory instruction for the experimental procedure and the participant tasks over the course of the experiment, record it, and save it in the appropriate format within the stimuli presentation software. 
	NOTE: Here is an example how to formulate the initial instruction: &#34;This measurement records your physiological activity while listening to scripts about personal events. This happens through the electrodes attached to your forehead, shoulders, and hand. Try to take a comfortable position in the chair. Your room is closed to shield noises. I can see you through the window, just as you can see me. If something is not right, you can always give me a sign and I&#39;ll be right next to you. It is important that you sit still during the measurement and do not move. There are regular breaks in which you can move. Overall, the investigation will take about half an hour. Each script presentation consists of four consecutive 30-second periods: rest condition, script listening, imagination, and relaxation. Please listen carefully to each script, and try to vividly imagine the illustrated experience in chronological order, both during the script presentation and afterwards, until you hear a new instruction. Each script is displayed totally three times. The measurement starts from now in about one minute, as soon as your physiological readings have reached a stable level. So you can relax first.&#34;</li>
	<li>Proceed similarly for the relaxation and self-report instruction that will be presented between each two scripts. 
	NOTE: Here is a possible formulation of such an instruction: &#34;Please relax. If you want, you can now move a little bit. Fill the questionnaire in by marking the answer options that best describe your feelings during the imagination of the event. Afterwards, try to find again a comfortable position, try to sit still again and continue to relax. Soon you will hear another script. Please listen carefully to it and try to imagine as vividly as possible and in chronological order the illustrated experience until you hear the next instruction.&#34;</li>
	<li>For the presentation of auditory instructions and scripts, use a stimulus computer and a scripting language-based computer software. Play back each script three times and insert four sequential 30-s periods within each script presentation as follows:&#160; resting baseline, read (listening to the spoken script), imagery (imagination of the described experience), and recovery (see Figure 2). In-between two script presentations, reserve a period of 1 - 2 minutes for filling the self-report measures in.</li>
	<li>Use an appropriate recording computer and software to collect physiological data during the experiment. Depending on the software for recording physiological data, prepare the necessary channels for the recording of physiological parameters (SC and HR).</li>
	<li>Set up markers or use separate channels for the depiction of the time course of the instructions and script presentations.
	<ol>
		<li>To subsequently facilitate the removal of artifacts from the physiological data, incorporate the possibility to flag movements. Save this recording set-up to allow its availability for all planned measurements.</li>
	</ol>
	</li>
</ol>
2. Participant selection
NOTE: For the selection and recruitment of the clinical study participants, available standards were considered (Sullivan-Bolyai et al., 2007)25.
<ol>
	<li>If possible, recruit clinical participants from a clinical setting for obtaining reliable information regarding the inclusion and exclusion criteria. Review medical records and clinical files, consult clinical-therapeutic staff (if possible), and ask participants to ascertain relevant information for the participant selection.</li>
	<li>Select clinical participants according to the following inclusion criteria: (a) ICD-10 diagnosis F60.31; (b) no medication (ask participants to abstain for 1 week prior to the laboratory experiment from any psychotropic medication or medication with potentially confounding autonomic effects, e.g. anticholinergic, &#945;- or &#946;-adrenergic blockers, digitals, and GABA-(A)-receptor-agonists including benzodiazepine); (c) legal competence, sufficient cognitive function, sufficiently stable psychological state, language proficiency; and (d) informed consent after detailed explanation of the objectives and procedure as well as answers to all the potential questions.</li>
	<li>Exclude potential clinical participants if the following criteria apply: (a) internal, neurological, musculoskeletal or endocrinological disorders; (b) acute suicidal ideation, history of schizophrenia-type disorders or bipolar disorder, substance abuse within the last week.</li>
	<li>Select control subjects with trauma histories, but without trauma-related or other psychological disorders and match those to the BPD group on age, gender, and education. 
	NOTE: If BPD participants are recruited from a clinical setting, it is possible to select controls by approaching stuff and trainees from the same institution. Since most people experience at least one threatening event during their lives, it is not difficult to find healthy subjects with trauma histories.</li>
</ol>
3. Clinical assessment
<ol>
	<li>Carry out an extensive evaluation of the psychological status of all participants with a focus on dissociative phenomena by clinically experienced investigators. Plan enough time for clinical assessment sessions (1 - 2 sessions of 60 - 90 min in length for each patient). Employ the following instruments (or equivalent ones):
	<ol>
		<li>Approach potential clinical participants and, after informed consent (see above), hand over self-report questionnaires and instruct the participant appropriately.</li>
		<li>Obtain information on age, graduation, marital and occupational status. 
		NOTE: In case study participants are recruited from a clinical setting, obtain sociodemographic from the documentation system of the clinic or routine data sets, if available.</li>
		<li>Inquire active substances consumed within the last weeks.</li>
		<li>Hand over the following instruments to the clinical participants.
		<ol>
			<li>Use the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ)26, a 28-item questionnaire composed of five subscales, each containing 5 items (emotional abuse, emotional neglect, physical abuse, physical neglect, and sexual abuse) and one response bias subscale, the minimization and denial scale including three items; the items consist of statements to be rated by choosing one of five response options: (1) &#34;never true,&#34;&#160;(2) &#34;rarely true,&#34;&#160;(3) &#34;sometimes true,&#34;&#160;(4) &#34;often true,&#34;&#160;and (5) &#34;very often true.&#34;</li>
			<li>Use the Life Event Checklist27 for the further assessment of traumatic exposure.</li>
			<li>Use the Peritraumatic Dissociative Experiences Scale (PDEQ)28, a 10-item self-report questionnaire measuring the extent of dissociation during the traumatic event and in the subsequent minutes and hours, accompanied by the instruction to fill in the questionnaire relating to their most severe traumatic event from the Life Event Checklist; score items on a 5-point Likert scale from 1 (not at all true) to 5 (extremely true).</li>
			<li>Use the initial questions from the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV-TR Axis I Disorders and the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis II Personality Disorders (SCID-I and SCID-II)29,30 administrated as a self-rating screening instrument allowing a reduction of the number of domains to be evaluated for the diagnosis of Axis I and personality disorders.</li>
			<li>Use the Borderline Symptom List (BSL)31, a 99-item self-report instrument assessing the severity of borderline symptoms within the previous week on a 5-point Likert scale, with the following answer possibilities: &#34;not at all,&#34;&#160;&#34;a little,&#34;&#160;&#34;rather,&#34;&#160;&#34;much,&#34;&#160;and &#34;very strong&#34;; it contains the following scales: self-perception (19 items), affect regulation (13 items), self-destruction (12 items), dysphoria (10 items), loneliness (12 items), intrusions (11 items), and hostility (6 items).</li>
			<li>Use the Dissociative Experiences Scale (DES)32, a 28-item questionnaire to screen for dissociative symptoms; items assess the intensity of dissociative experiences from 0% of the time (never) to 100% of the time (always).</li>
			<li>Use the Symptom Check List-90-Revised (SCL-90-R)33, a 90-item self-report instrument evaluating a broad range of psychological problems and symptoms; it contains nine scales (Somatization, Obsessive-Compulsive, Interpersonal Sensitivity, Depression, Anxiety, Hostility, Phobic Anxiety, Paranoid Ideation, Psychoticism) and provides an index of symptom severity as the summary of the test; Construct items on a 5-point Likert-scale, from 0 (not at all) to 4 (very strong).</li>
		</ol>
		</li>
	</ol>
	</li>
	<li>Proceed similarly for the self-report assessment of the control subjects, except for the following: (a) do not hand any SCID-I and SCID-II questions to control participants (see below in the clinical interview section); (b) for reasons of effort-reduction, employ only a short SCL-version instead of SCL-90-R (namely SCL-14)34.</li>
	<li>Arrange an appointment soon for the clinical interview, making sure that the participant can fill in all self-report measures by then.</li>
	<li>At the beginning of the clinical Interview session, make sure that the participants filled in all self-report items in the first place, clarify unresolved items, and ask supplementary questions if necessary.</li>
	<li>Discuss in-depth the items of the CTQ and Life Event Checklist by asking questions about the type and time of the inquired experiences; if necessary, correct the reports accordingly.</li>
	<li>Use clinical standardized interviews for a differentiate diagnosis of both groups, as follows. 
	NOTE: For reasons of effort reduction, use less extensive, but equivalent diagnostic instruments, to screen for mental disorders within the control group.
	<ol>
		<li>Employ a broader battery of clinical diagnostic interviews for the clinical group: (a) the Clinician Administered PTSD Scale (CAPS)35 for the diagnosis of PTSD; (b) the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Dissociative Disorders (SCID-D)36 for diagnosing dissociative disorders; and (c) SCID-I and SCID-II interviews. Within the SCID interviews, conduct detailed inquiries only of the domains indicated by the self-report screening questions.</li>
		<li>Administrate only the Mini-International Neuropsychiatric Interview (M.I.N.I.)37 to control participants. Based on this short structured clinical interview that allows diagnosis of psychiatric disorders according to both DSM-IV and ICD-10 criteria, ascertain the absence of mental disorders as well as the report of at least one past traumatic experience for the inclusion in the control group.</li>
	</ol>
	</li>
</ol>
4. Procedures for the preparation of the psychophysiological experiment for each participant
<ol>
	<li>At the end of the clinical interview section, ask the participant to specify and vividly describe the following three types of events: a traumatic one (in case of several traumatic experiences, instruct the participant to choose the one perceived as the worst), as well as two further individual experiences, a neutral one (e.g., cleaning the house, getting up early, or accomplishing other usual, slightly unpleasant everyday duties) and an everyday moderately positive event (e.g., enjoyable, relaxing or fun activities).</li>
	<li>Within the event descriptions, inquire objective happenings (i.e., time, place, and context) as well as subjective information (i.e., emotions, sensory perception); take detailed notes allowing subsequent draft of the three verbal scripts (neutral, negative, and traumatic/aversive), which will be used as individualized emotional cues.</li>
	<li>Make an appointment for the psychophysiological experiment within the next few days. Instruct the participant not to use any hand lotion or cream before the experiment.</li>
	<li>Shortly after the clinical interview, compose verbal scripts of ca. 30 s duration that portray the three recalled personal experiences in the first person singular, present tense and register them on a voice recorder. Stick as much as possible to the individual formulations of the participants when describing their experiences (see Figure 1 for an example of traumatic script).
	<ol>
		<li>Save them as audio files in the appropriate format and transfer them in the software program on the stimulus computer, serving to present the recorded auditory scripts.</li>
	</ol>
	</li>
	<li>Randomize the order of the script presentation. Adopt and save the resulted order of the scripts in the presentation program and put it on record, to account for it during data analyses.</li>
	<li>Transfer and save the scripts in the resulting order into the presentation program. Use a scripting language based computer program which sends simultaneously auditory stimuli to a headphone and marker signals to the psychophysiological recording device at millisecond accuracy. 
	NOTE: To avoid overstraining severely traumatized persons, use a pseudorandomized script sequence by beginning with the presentation of either a neutral or positive script and not leaving any consecutive presentations of the traumatic script. Based on our experience, we cannot confirm the participation of severely traumatized persons in such experiments as being potentially stressful in any way. For this reason, we regard the randomization of scripts under these constraints as only optionally.</li>
	<li>Prepare the sheets and a pencil to collect subjective evaluative judgments of affective states during the script-driven imagery tasks. Employ a battery of visual analog 9-point Likert scales: (a) the Self-Assessment Manikin (SAM)38 to evaluate the degree of arousal and dominance of the imagery; (b) similarly constructed scales to assess a set of other discrete emotions (e.g., fear, disgust); and (c) a short version of the scale Dissociation Tension Scale-acute (DSS-4)39 to measure the state dissociation. 
	NOTE: There are also other instruments assessing responses to trauma-related memory. We also suggest the use of the Responses to Script-driven Imagery (RSDI)40 that additionally assesses re-experiences and re-experiencing and avoidance.</li>
	<li>Prepare receipts of monetary compensations as well as the corresponding amount of money. 
	NOTE: Our participants received 20 Euros.</li>
</ol>
5. Psychophysiological experiment
NOTE: Experimental set-up: The experiment followed the guidelines of psychophysiological measurements for the measurement of reactions to emotional cues41.
<ol>
	<li>Conduct the psychophysiological experimental session in a sound-attenuated and temperature- and humidity-controlled laboratory connected via wires and window to an adjoining portion of the laboratory in which the experimental equipment is located.</li>
	<li>Reserve enough time for conducting the physiological assessments (ca. 60 - 90 min per participant).</li>
	<li>Once the participant arrived at the laboratory, show him/her the facilities and the recording instruments and explain their function.</li>
	<li>Seat the participant in a comfortable chair and allow a period of adaptation to the recording environment while explaining again the procedure from the informed consent and answering any further questions.</li>
	<li>Ask participants whether they used any hand lotion in advance and, if necessary, ask them to clean and dry their hands. Clean the required contact skin areas with alcohol solution pads. Attach physiological monitoring devices.
	<ol>
		<li>Use adhesive, pregelled, 279 AgAg/Cl snap electrodes with circular contact areas, filled with an appropriate electrode gel: (a) for the SC measurement, place electrodes on the palmar surface (hypothenar and thenar eminence of the non-dominant hand); (b) for HR recording, use a Lead II configuration of three electrodes (two electrodes placed on the chest below the left and the right shoulder and reference electrode placed e.g. on the forehead). Apply headphones for the presentation of the instruction and scripts.</li>
	</ol>
	</li>
	<li>Perform a test run of the measurements to make sure that the participant hears the instructions and the physiological recordings are running well.</li>
	<li>Begin the assessment approximately five minutes later in order to allow physiological readings to stabilize.</li>
	<li>Pay attention to any movements of the participant during the experiment and, depending on the software, press a key/take notes to mark artifacts when necessary.</li>
	<li>At the end of the experiment, remove all devices and clean the skin areas if requested. Provide monetary compensation and receipts. Offer the participant the opportunity to show and explain the physiological recordings. Ask whether the participant needs to share thoughts and experiences or to receive any further assistance.</li>
	<li>Clean the electrodes with cold water to allow the removal of any gel rests.</li>
</ol>

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

The present protocol describes an integrated assessment of peripheral physiological responding, self-reports, and clinical assessments for the study of trauma-related dissociation in BPD. For the realization of this procedure, it is important to control for confounders of physiological activity, to ensure functional recordings of physiological data before measurements, and to collect clinical data by expert investigators.
Limits of such integrated assessments protocols may concern the sensitiv...

In perceiving danger, humans experience anxiety and the body reacts rapidly within the defense cascade to minimize injury and ensure survival. Defense reactions include initial stages of increasing arousal and sympathetic activation and, in event of inescapable threats (e.g., child abuse, rape, torture), parasympathetically modulated &#34;shut-down&#34; dissociative reactions (e.g., bradycardia, vasodilatation, sensory deafferentation, alterations of consciousness and speech1,2) become predominant. According to the theories of reactivation of trauma-related associative memory networks3,4, the prevalent type of the peritraumatic psychophysiological reactions (arousal vs. dissociation) would result in one of the two major subtypes of clinical profiles and reaction patterns to trauma-related stimuli2. Considering the heterogeneity of responses to activation of trauma-related memory across various neuroimaging PTSD studies, Lanius et al. (2006)5 argued that &#34;grouping all PTSD subjects, regardless of their different symptom patterns, in the same diagnostic category may interfere with our understanding of posttrauma psychopathology&#34;. The influence of dissociative responding on the psychopathology and psychophysiology of traumatized persons has been studied in the area of PTSD. For example, Schalinski, Elbert &#38; Schauer (2011)6 showed that shut-down dissociation predicts PTSD and other comorbid disorders. The use of psychophysiological assessments pointed to modifications of the defense cascade allowing for a rapid flight in response to threat7,8. Schalinski et al. (2013)8 revealed that the type of traumatic events seems to influence the cardiac startle response. Another study9 indicated a pattern of &#34;blunted&#34; reactivity &#8212; an arousal-dissociation mix characterized by simultaneous activation of both autonomous nervous system branches &#8212; in more severely traumatized individuals. So far, no studies in this regard have been conducted on other clinical populations often affected by psychological trauma and dissociative symptoms (e.g., BPD).
In the research of human emotion and behavior, it is of particular importance to examine and integrate information from several levels: subjective (verbal expression, prosody), behavioral (motor, facial expression, etc.), physiological (trembling, sweating, heart rate, etc.). By arguing that assessments that omit one or more of these three modes of emotional expression can be highly misleading, Lang (1998)10 emphasized the relevance of multimodal assessment that involves procedures of observation of behavior, self-report/clinical measures, and psychophysiological measurement.
Extreme states of anxiety and pronounced physiological arousal are characteristic of anxiety, trauma-, and stressor-related disorders. According to the psychophysiological concept, these disorders may be conceived as an outcome of the modified autonomic reactivity (generally higher) to negative stimuli. These measurable psychophysiological response indices as part of the diagnostic criteria made them obvious targets for psychophysiological research. Particularly PTSD, as a psychological disorder with a definite event criterion (i.e., life-threatening experiences, such as accidents, physical/sexual assaults, natural disasters, incarceration, military combat, and torture), offered a valuable opportunity for psychophysiological assessments.
Various assessment designs using different paradigms, stimuli, and physiological parameters have been used for the study of PTSD. Monitoring peripheral physiological parameters provide reliable measures of changes in autonomic activity, related to emotional and cognitive states. Among these, skin conductance is a common measure with a long history in psychophysiological research and is regarded as a highly sensitive index11. Its monitoring is often combined with the recording of heart rate, a further autonomically dependent variable.
For the measurement of peripheral physiological parameters, the use of script-driven imagery experiments was a major paradigm for the investigation of emotional and physiological reactions to the activation of trauma-related memory. Within the script-driven imagery paradigm12, participants are asked to vividly imagine aversive situations triggered by short verbal scripts13,14,15,16. The subject is solicited to imagine a situation as if he/she was reliving the real course of events, including actions, persons, and emotions present during the real situation (see Figure 1 for an example of a traumatic script). The traumatic situation imagined is usually compared with other kinds of not-traumatic scenes.
Script-driven imagery was mainly employed in various populations affected by PTSD, e.g. Vietnam veterans15,17, victims of accidents18, and former political prisoners19. An enhanced reactivity to traumatic cues was usually found, but there are also several findings of absence of such a higher reactivity to trauma-related stimuli (e.g., Orr &#38; Roth, 2000; Davis et al., 1996)15,20. Growing knowledge on the psychophysiology of PTSD was followed by an increased bulk of psychophysiological research in the area of trauma-related and other psychological disorders. Meanwhile, however, script-driven imagery paradigms have been successfully applied to study dissociative processes in BPD 21,22.
This paper presents a protocol to investigate whether persons with BPD reporting high levels of PD predominantly exhibit dissociative reactions with suppression of autonomic responses during the script-driven trauma-related imagery23,24. Additionally, our study aimed at proving whether there are clinically different BPD subgroups, as tested by structured clinical interviews and symptom scales. The present protocol combines extensive, standardized clinical assessments with measuring physiological (HR and SC) and subjective responses within a script-driven imagery paradigm. Reactions to trauma-related personalized scripts compared to scripts portraying everyday events were analyzed. The protocol provides a model for the investigation of dissociative processes and their impact on psychopathological and psychophysiological features of BPD.

<table>
	<tbody>
		<tr>
			<td>Experimental Runtime System (ERTS) Version 3.32</td>
			<td>BeriSoft Cooperation, Frankfurt/Main, Germany</td>
			<td></td>
			<td>We used a scripting language based computer programme wich sends simultanously auditory stimuli to a headphone and marker signals to a psychophysiological recording device at millisecond accuracy.</td>
		</tr>
		<tr>
			<td>Biopac MP150 system</td>
			<td>Biopac Systems, Inc., Goleta, CA</td>
			<td></td>
			<td>We recorded the physiological data by using this hardware .</td>
		</tr>
		<tr>
			<td>AcqKnowledge software</td>
			<td>Biopac Systems, Inc.</td>
			<td></td>
			<td>We recorded the physiological data by using this software.</td>
		</tr>
		<tr>
			<td>VOC</td>
			<td></td>
			<td></td>
			<td>Format for the auditory files for instructions and script, compatibele with the stimulus presentation software.</td>
		</tr>
	</tbody>
</table>

use of a psychophysiological script-driven imagery experiment to study trauma-related dissociation in borderline personality disorder

This protocol offers a detailed description of a psychophysiological experiment using script-driven trauma-related imagery and standardized clinical instruments within a comparative design assessing physiological and psychopathological features of individuals with BPD. This method aims at studying the psychological and physiological effects of trauma-related dissociation. Since the psychodiagnostic classification of trauma-related disorders relies on the observation of evolutionarily determined responses to life-threat, an integrated assessment paradigm for the study of reactions to traumatic memories proposes a very appropriate methodological approach.
The employed script-driven imagery paradigm uses individual recall instructions to activate trauma-related memory networks and prompt associated emotional and physiological responses. These responses are measured by means of self-rating scales and physiological assessments. During the individual recall, participants are asked to vividly imagine traumatic and everyday experiences and other situations triggered by short personalized verbal scripts they authored beforehand together with the experimenters. A wide range of affective reactions and different physiological parameters can be measured. We used this paradigm to investigate dissociative states in BPD and to find physiological and affective correlates of dissociative states. Some of the participants were having severe traumatic antecedents.
To investigate different reaction patterns within the same diagnostic group, participants with different levels of traumatic histories, symptom severities, and co-morbidities should be included. By using short verbal scripts, the level of stress induced to participants is held as low as possible without affecting the validity of the object of investigation.

There are many behaviors reflected in emotional and physiological reactions that can be studied by script-driven imagery paradigms. For instance, the design is suitable to investigate patterns of emotional and physiological response to trauma-related memory. We were particularly interested in verifying whether there is a distinct BPD subgroup mainly characterized by a dissociative reaction pattern.
In our study...

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Use of a Psychophysiological Script-driven Imagery Experiment to Study Trauma-related Dissociation in Borderline Personality Disorder

We present a protocol of personalized script-driven trauma-related imagery and clinical assessments within a comparison design for investigating peritraumatic dissociation (PD), psychophysiological reactions, i.e. heart rate (HR) and skin conductance (SC), and psychological features of often severely traumatized individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD).

This protocol offers a detailed description of a psychophysiological experiment using script-driven trauma-related imagery and standardized clinical ...

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12.2K Views.  Ulm University. We present a protocol of personalized script-driven trauma-related imagery and clinical assessments within a comparison design for investigating peritraumatic dissociation (PD), psychophysiological reactions, i.e. heart rate (HR) and skin conductance (SC), and psychological features of often severely traumatized individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD).

Video: Use of a Psychophysiological Script-driven Imagery Experiment to Study Trauma-related Dissociation in Borderline Personality Disorder

Use of the Operant Orofacial Pain Assessment Device (OPAD) to Measure Changes in Nociceptive Behavior

We present an operant system for the detection of pain in awake, conscious rodents. The Orofacial Pain Assessment Device (OPAD) assesses pain behaviors in a more clinically relevant way by not relying on reflex-based measures of nociception. Food fasted, hairless (or shaved) rodents are placed into a Plexiglas chamber which has two Peltier-based thermodes that can be programmed to any temperature between 7 &deg;C and 60 &deg;C. The rodent is trained to make contact with these in order to access a reward bottle. During a session, a number of behavioral pain outcomes are automatically recorded and saved. These measures include the number of reward bottle activations (licks) and facial contact stimuli (face contacts), but custom measures like the lick/face ratio (total number of licks per session/total number of contacts) can also be created. The stimulus temperature can be set to a single temperature or multiple temperatures within a session. The OPAD is a high-throughput, easy to use operant assay which will lead to better translation of pain research in the future as it includes cortical input instead of relying on spinal reflex-based nociceptive assays.

Use of the Operant Orofacial Pain Assessment Device OPAD to Measure Changes in Nociceptive Behavior

We present a user-friendly, high-throughput operant system for the evaluation of pain behaviors in awake, conscious rodents. The Orofacial Pain Assessment Device (OPAD) can assess pain through a reward/conflict paradigm thus providing a more humane way of testing. This protocol will yield more clinically relevant and translational data from rodents.

We present an operant  system for the detection of pain in awake, conscious rodents. The Orofacial  Pain Assessment Device (OPAD) assesses pain behaviors ...

A Procedure to Study the Effect of Prolonged Food Restriction on Heroin Seeking in Abstinent Rats

In human drug addicts, exposure to drug-associated cues or environments that were previously associated with drug taking can trigger relapse during abstinence. Moreover, various environmental challenges can exacerbate this effect, as well as increase ongoing drug intake.
The procedure we describe here highlights the impact of a common environmental challenge, food restriction, on drug craving that is expressed as an augmentation of drug seeking in abstinent rats.
Rats are implanted with chronic intravenous i.v. catheters, and then trained to press a lever for i.v. heroin over a period of 10-12 days. Following the heroin self-administration phase the rats are removed from the operant conditioning chambers and housed in the animal care facility for a period of at least 14 days. While one group is maintained under unrestricted access to food (sated group), a second group (FDR group) is exposed to a mild food restriction regimen that results in their body weights maintained at 90% of their nonrestricted body weight. On day 14 of food restriction the rats are transferred back to the drug-training environment, and a drug-seeking test is run under extinction conditions (i.e.&#160;lever presses do not result in heroin delivery).
The procedure presented here results in a highly robust augmentation of heroin seeking on test day in the food restricted rats. In addition, compared to the acute food deprivation manipulations we have used before, the current procedure is a more clinically relevant model for the impact of caloric restriction on drug seeking. Moreover, it might be closer to the human condition as the rats are not required to go through an extinction-training phase before the drug-seeking test, which is an integral component of the popular reinstatement procedure.

A procedure that allows a demonstration of robust augmentation of drug seeking in food-restricted rats is described. Following heroin self-administration training, rats go through an abstinence period, in a drug-free environment, during which they are mildly food restricted. Drug seeking is then tested in the drug-associated environment.

In human drug addicts, exposure to drug-associated cues or environments that were previously associated with drug taking can trigger relapse during ...

Uncovering Beat Deafness: Detecting Rhythm Disorders with Synchronized Finger Tapping and Perceptual Timing Tasks

A set of behavioral tasks for assessing perceptual and sensorimotor timing abilities in the general population (i.e., non-musicians) is presented here with the goal of uncovering rhythm disorders, such as beat deafness. Beat deafness is characterized by poor performance in perceiving durations in auditory rhythmic patterns or poor synchronization of movement with auditory rhythms (e.g., with musical beats). These tasks include the synchronization of finger tapping to the beat of simple and complex auditory stimuli and the detection of rhythmic irregularities (anisochrony detection task) embedded in the same stimuli. These tests, which are easy to administer, include an assessment of both perceptual and sensorimotor timing abilities under different conditions (e.g., beat rates and types of auditory material) and are based on the same auditory stimuli, ranging from a simple metronome to a complex musical excerpt. The analysis of synchronized tapping data is performed with circular statistics, which provide reliable measures of synchronization accuracy (e.g., the difference between the timing of the taps and the timing of the pacing stimuli) and consistency. Circular statistics on tapping data are particularly well-suited for detecting individual differences in the general population. Synchronized tapping and anisochrony detection are sensitive measures for identifying profiles of rhythm disorders and have been used with success to uncover cases of poor synchronization with spared perceptual timing. This systematic assessment of perceptual and sensorimotor timing can be extended to populations of patients with brain damage, neurodegenerative diseases (e.g., Parkinson&#8217;s disease), and developmental disorders (e.g., Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder).

Behavioral tasks that allow for the assessment of perceptual and sensorimotor timing abilities in the general population (i.e., non-musicians) are presented. Synchronization of finger tapping to the beat of an auditory stimuli and detecting rhythmic irregularities provides a means of uncovering rhythm disorders.

A set of behavioral tasks for assessing perceptual and sensorimotor timing abilities in the general population (i.e., non-musicians) is presented here ...

Signal Attenuation as a Rat Model of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

In the signal attenuation rat model of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), lever-pressing for food is followed by the presentation of a compound stimulus which serves as a feedback cue. This feedback is later attenuated by repeated presentations of the stimulus without food (without the rat emitting the lever-press response). In the next stage, lever-pressing is assessed under extinction conditions (i.e., no food is delivered). At this stage rats display two types of lever-presses, those that are followed by an attempt to collect a reward, and those that are not. The latter are the measure of compulsive-like behavior in the model. A control procedure in which rats do not experience the attenuation of the feedback cue serves to distinguish between the effects of signal attenuation and of extinction. The signal attenuation model is a highly validated model of OCD and differentiates between compulsive-like behaviors and behaviors that are repetitive but not compulsive. In addition the measures collected during the procedure eliminate alternative explanations for differences between the groups being tested, and are quantitative, unbiased and unaffected by inter-experimenter variability. The major disadvantages of this model are the costly equipment, the fact that it requires some technical know-how and the fact that it is time-consuming compared to other models of OCD (11 days). The model may be used for detecting the anti- or pro-compulsive effects of pharmacological and non-pharmacological manipulations and for studying the neural substrate of compulsive behavior.

The goal of the protocol described in this paper is to induce compulsive-like behavior in rats for the study of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). This behavior is precipitated by attenuating a signal indicating that a lever-press response was effective in producing food.

In the signal attenuation rat model of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), lever-pressing for food is followed by the presentation of a compound stimulus ...

Testing Sensory and Multisensory Function in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

In addition to impairments in social communication and the presence of restricted interests and repetitive behaviors, deficits in sensory processing are now recognized as a core symptom in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Our ability to perceive and interact with the external world is rooted in sensory processing. For example, listening to a conversation entails processing the auditory cues coming from the speaker (speech content, prosody, syntax) as well as the associated visual information (facial expressions, gestures). Collectively, the &#8220;integration&#8221; of these multisensory (i.e., combined audiovisual) pieces of information results in better comprehension. Such multisensory integration has been shown to be strongly dependent upon the temporal relationship of the paired stimuli. Thus, stimuli that occur in close temporal proximity are highly likely to result in behavioral and perceptual benefits &#8211; gains believed to be reflective of the perceptual system&#39;s judgment of the likelihood that these two stimuli came from the same source. Changes in this temporal integration are expected to strongly alter perceptual processes, and are likely to diminish the ability to accurately perceive and interact with our world. Here, a battery of tasks designed to characterize various aspects of sensory and multisensory temporal processing in children with ASD is described. In addition to its utility in autism, this battery has great potential for characterizing changes in sensory function in other clinical populations, as well as being used to examine changes in these processes across the lifespan.

We describe how to implement a battery of behavioral tasks to examine the processing and integration of sensory stimuli in children with ASD. The goal is to characterize individual differences in temporal processing of simple auditory and visual stimuli and relate these to higher order perceptual skills like speech perception.

In addition to impairments in social communication and the presence of restricted interests and repetitive behaviors, deficits in sensory processing are ...

Event-related Potentials During Target-response Tasks to Study Cognitive Processes of Upper Limb Use in Children with Unilateral Cerebral Palsy

Unilateral Cerebral Palsy (CP) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is a very common cause of disability in childhood. It is characterized by unilateral motor impairments that are frequently dominated in the upper limb. In addition to a reduced movement capacity of the affected upper limb, several children with unilateral CP show a reduced awareness of the remaining movement capacity of that limb. This phenomenon of disregarding the preserved capacity of the affected upper limb is regularly referred to as Developmental Disregard (DD). Different theories have been postulated to explain DD, each suggesting slightly different guidelines for therapy. Still, cognitive processes that might additionally contribute to DD in children with unilateral CP have never been directly studied. The current protocol was developed to study cognitive aspects involved in upper limb control in children with unilateral CP with and without DD. This was done by recording event-related potentials (ERPs) extracted from the ongoing EEG during target-response tasks asking for a hand-movement response. ERPs consist of several components, each of them associated with a well-defined cognitive process (e.g., the N1 with early attention processes, the N2 with cognitive control and the P3 with cognitive load and mental effort). Due to its excellent temporal resolution, the ERP technique enables to study several covert cognitive processes preceding overt motor responses and thus allows insight into the cognitive processes that might contribute to the phenomenon of DD. Using this protocol adds a new level of explanation to existing behavioral studies and opens new avenues to the broader implementation of research on cognitive aspects of developmental movement restrictions in children.

Several children with unilateral Cerebral Palsy seem to disregard the preserved capacity of their affected upper limb. This Developmental Disregard is extensively described in the literature but the involved cognitive processes have not been studied. To study underlying cognitive factors of upper limb control, an event-related potential protocol was developed.

Unilateral Cerebral Palsy (CP) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that is a very common cause of disability in childhood. It is characterized by unilateral ...

Psychophysiological Assessment of the Effectiveness of Emotion Regulation Strategies in Childhood

Effective regulation of emotion is one of the most important skills that develops in childhood. Research interest in this area is expanding, but empirical work has been limited by predominantly correlational investigations of children's skills. Relatedly, a key conceptual challenge for emotion scientists is to distinguish between emotion responding and emotion regulatory processes. This paper presents a novel method to address these conceptual and methodological issues in child samples. An experimental paradigm that assesses the effectiveness with which children regulate emotion is described. Children are randomly assigned to use specific emotion regulation strategies, negative emotions are elicited with film clips, and changes in subsequent psychophysiology index the extent to which emotion regulation is effective. Children are instructed to simply watch the emotion-eliciting film (control), distract themselves from negative emotions (cognitive distraction), or reframe the situation in a way that downplays the importance of the emotional event (cognitive reappraisal). Cardiac physiology, continuously acquired before and during the emotional task, serves as an objective measure of children's unfolding emotional responding while viewing evocative films. Key comparisons in patterns of obtained physiological reactivity are between the control and emotion regulation strategy conditions. Representative results from this approach are described, and discussion focuses on the contribution of this methodological approach to developmental science.

A detailed protocol for an experimental paradigm to assess the effectiveness with which children regulate emotion is described. Children are randomly assigned to use specific emotion regulation strategies, negative emotions are elicited with film clips, and changes in subsequent psychophysiology index the extent to which emotion regulation is effective.

Effective regulation of emotion is one of the most important skills that develops in childhood. Research interest in this area is expanding, but empirical ...

Reversible Cooling-induced Deactivations to Study Cortical Contributions to Obstacle Memory in the Walking Cat

On complex, naturalistic terrain, sensory information about an environmental obstacle can be used to rapidly adjust locomotor movements for avoidance. For example, in the cat, visual information about an impending obstacle can modulate stepping for avoidance. Locomotor adaptation can also occur independent of vision, as sudden tactile inputs to the leg by an expected obstacle can modify the stepping of all four legs for avoidance. Such complex locomotor coordination involves supraspinal structures, such as the parietal cortex. This protocol describes the use of reversible, cooling-induced cortical deactivation to assess parietal cortex contributions to memory-guided obstacle locomotion in the cat. Small cooling loops, known as cryoloops, are specially shaped to deactivate discrete regions of interest to assess their contributions to an overt behavior. Such methods have been used to elucidate the role of parietal area 5 in memory-guided obstacle avoidance in the cat.

Complex locomotion in naturalistic environments requiring careful coordination of the limbs involves regions of the parietal cortex. The following protocol describes the use of reversible cooling-induced deactivation to demonstrate the role of parietal area 5 in memory-guided obstacle avoidance in the walking cat.

On complex, naturalistic terrain, sensory information about an environmental obstacle can be used to rapidly adjust locomotor movements for avoidance. For ...

A Semantic Priming Event-related Potential (ERP) Task to Study Lexico-semantic and Visuo-semantic Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have characteristic deficits in understanding the meaning of language, or semantic processing. However, some evidence indicates that semantic processing of non-linguistic stimuli is intact, suggesting that semantic deficits may be language-specific. To appropriately characterize semantic processing deficits in individuals with ASD, comparison of within-modality linguistic (e.g., written words) and non-linguistic (e.g., pictures) stimuli is required. This paper describes such a methodology that makes use of a semantic priming paradigm during concurrent recording of electroencephalographic (EEG) data. EEG provides a dynamic measure of brain activity that is well-suited to characterize subtle differences in semantic processing that may not be observable at the behavioral level. The semantic priming paradigm presents a prime picture or word (e.g., dog) followed by a target picture or word that is either related (e.g., cat) or unrelated (e.g., pencil) to the prime. This paradigm can thus be used to evaluate semantic processing across different modalities, and to compare lexico-semantic and visuo-semantic processing abilities in individuals with ASD and how they might differ from TD individuals. The specific steps involved in creating the stimuli, performing the EEG testing, and analyzing the EEG data are discussed. Representative results illustrate how the N400 component of the event-related potential (ERP) is reduced following semantically-related prime-target pairs compared to unrelated pairs. Comparisons of the N400 between conditions, modalities, and groups can provide estimates of the success of semantic processing, and can thereby be used to characterize semantic deficits in individuals with ASD or other clinical populations.

A Semantic Priming Event-related Potential ERP Task to Study Lexico-semantic and Visuo-semantic Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder

This paper describes a semantic priming ERP task using within-modality pairs of pictures and words to investigate semantic processing in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

Individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have characteristic deficits in understanding the meaning of language, or semantic processing. However, ...

Using a Classroom-Based Deese Roediger McDermott Paradigm to Assess the Effects of Imagery on False Memories

Associated word list procedures can elicit false memories in predictable ways by inducing associative processing, thus making it harder to monitor the accuracy of memories. The purpose of the method presented here was to induce false memories using lists of either semantically or phonologically related words and to assess the effects of imagery instructions on the recall and recognition of those false memories. To do this, we used a modified version of the Deese Roediger McDermott (DRM) paradigm. We adapted word lists from previous DRM studies to suit imagery procedures and created an automated presentation to present the word lists in classroom settings. We then recruited undergraduate classes and instructed some of the classes to create mental images of the list words as they were being presented, while instructing the other classes to simply remember the words. The automated presentation presented word lists to participants, one word at a time, alternating between phonologically and semantically related lists. Participants used paper-pencil recall packets to immediately recall list items, complete a distractor activity, and take a subsequent final recognition test. Often, participants immediately recalled and later recognized words that were related to the list items but were not actually presented; these are known as critical lures and indicate a false memory. The protocol detailed here describes a four-step procedure - list presentation, immediate recall, distractor phase, and final recognition - that can assess the effects of list type and imagery instruction within the DRM paradigm on memory. The automated nature of the list presentation provides the ability to systematically vary variables of interest, and the paper and pencil method of data collection affords an easily accessible method for collecting data in classroom settings. The protocol also offers options to modify the procedure to a more traditional DRM paradigm without imagery and/or list type manipulations. The use of this protocol can provide results relevant to both classroom learning and cognitive science principles.

The method presented here induced false memories using lists of related words and also assessed the effects of imagery instructions on the recall and recognition of those false memories. This protocol details a modified version of the Deese Roediger McDermott (DRM) paradigm.

Associated word list procedures can elicit false memories in predictable ways by inducing associative processing, thus making it harder to monitor the ...