Optimizing Exposure Therapy With Mental Rehearsal

After each exposure session, participants complete three rehearsal/retrieval exercises that involve viewing images of spiders and completing multiple-choice and free-response questions. Exercises involve retrieving information specific to the spider exposures, reflecting on the experience, and highlighting expectancy violation (i.e., that the participant's feared outcome did not occur).

All participants complete two exposure sessions. The first set of exposures consists of ten 30-second trials hovering one's hand 3 inches over a live tarantula. The second set of exposures consists of ten 30-second trials placing one's hand inside the spider's terrarium with all five fingertips touching the bottom.