Use of the FLARe Smartphone App in a Trauma-Exposed Sample: A Feasibility Study

Laboratory-based paradigms allow for the collection of multimodal assessments. A fear conditioning (FC) paradigm, capturing one key risk factor for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and alcohol use disorder, has been administered in a lab-based format. Recently, a smartphone-based application (app, specifically called “Fear Learning and Anxiety Response, FLARe”) of this FC paradigm has been administered within control and anxiety samples. However, this app has not been administered to trauma-exposed individuals. Thus, the primary goal of this study was to test the feasibility of this app among those with a trauma history. Results suggest that this app can be administered to trauma-exposed individuals and that they acquire fear, defined as expectancy that a loud noise will occur, to previously neutral stimuli ( t = −12.55, p <.001), and then extinguish that fear immediately ( t = −4.95, p <.001), and the next day ( t = −4.01, p <.001). Thus, study findings provide preliminary evidence that this FC task is not functioning in the same way in the app as it does in the lab for trauma-exposed participants.