Pilot Study on AI-Generated Imagery Rescripting for Adults with Childhood Criticism Memories Assessing Emotional and Anxiety Outcomes Using Personalized Therapeutic Scripts

What this Trial Is About

This research aims to explore the use of generative artificial intelligence to create personalized therapeutic scripts for imagery rescripting ImRs based on participants childhood memories of parental criticism and neutral events. The study focuses on evaluating emotional and physiological responses to AI-generated content and compares the effects of an ImRs intervention with no therapeutic modification. The trial involves adults aged 18 to 35 with generalized anxiety, fear of failure, and rumination symptoms. Participants will provide descriptions of two critical and two neutral childhood memories, which will be used to generate personalized scripts with the Gemini large language model. On Day 1, all participants will listen to both critical and neutral scenarios. They will be randomly assigned to either an experimental group receiving an ImRs intervention, where a therapist figure addresses unmet needs in the critical memory script, or a control group hearing the unmodified scripts. Skin conductance and emotional ratings will be recorded during the session. Follow-up questionnaires will be completed one week later. During the study, participants will rate their emotional responses, and physiological arousal will be monitored continuously. Licensed cognitive-behavioral therapists will evaluate the therapeutic quality of the generated scripts. Outcome measures include anxiety symptoms, intrusive thoughts, emotional intensity, and physiological responses to the scenarios. The study will assess the feasibility of AI-assisted therapeutic scripts and their potential to reduce distress and improve emotional regulation over time.

Optimization of Imagery Rescripting Research Using Generative Artificial Intelligence