Processing of phobic stimuli and its relationship to outcome

In the present study, we explored factors related to successful treatment o utcome in a sample of participants with fear of spiders, We specifically ex amined the relationship of general memory, memory for the phobic stimulus, memory for anxious responses, and perceived self-efficacy to treatment outc ome. Forty-eight participants who were afraid of spiders participated in tw o sessions of in vivo exposure therapy. On day 1, participants completed me asures of general memory, memory for the phobic stimulus, recall of anxiety level during exposure tasks, and self-efficacy during exposure tasks. At p ost-treatment, better memory for anxious responses, but not memory for the phobic stimulus, was related to lower anticipatory and actual anxiety. Grea ter self-efficacy, on the other hand, was related to better behavioral perf ormance. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.