Understanding Emotions and Decision-Making
This study aims to understand how negative emotions like stress, pain, craving, and frustration affect your brain and how you make decisions. Researchers will induce these states using methods like thermal pain, stress-inducing tasks, snack craving induction, and watching emotionally-charged videos. They will then measure how your decisions change and look at brain activity in decision-making areas. The goal is to better understand how emotions influence behavior in healthy people, which could help those with mental health conditions. This study is looking for healthy individuals aged 18 to 55 years old. The study's success will be measured by changes in your decision-making and brain activity after these emotional states are induced. The current recruitment status is unclear.
- Study design
- This interventional study plans to enroll 900 healthy participants. It involves within-subject experimental manipulations of different emotional states.
- What's involved
- You would have 3 clinic visits over 3 weeks. During these visits, you will fill out questionnaires about your personal history, personality, and state of mind.
- Compensation
- Not stated in the trial record.
- Follow-up
- The primary endpoints (decision-making metrics and brain activity) are measured right after the interventions.
AI-generated from the public study record. Only the study team can confirm whether you're eligible — confirm details with them before making decisions.
NCT05666726
State-dependent Interoception, Value-based Decision-making, and Introspection
Recruiting
NAAges 18–55InterventionalBasic scienceNational Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)Government-funded
~900 participants
Updated 2026-06-30 on ClinicalTrials.gov
What's tested:PainStressCravingFrustrationNegative valence emotion
At a glance
Recruiting sites
1 of 1 listed site is recruiting right now
RecruitingSuspended, closed, or not yet open
What they're measuring
Value-based decision-making metrics
Measured over Right after intervention
+1 more outcome measured
Conditions
Where it's being run
1 sites across 1 statesMaryland1
Study leadership
- Silvia Lopez Guzman, M.D. · PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR · National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)
Who to contact
Opens a ready-to-send draft in your own email app — review before sending.
Do you actually qualify for this trial?
Add a private profile and we'll compare every criterion below against your situation — and tell you which ones are met, uncertain, or excluding.
Eligibility criteria
Inclusion
Ability of subject to understand and the willingness to sign a written informed consent document.
All sexes; Age 18 to 55.
Able to read and write in English to guarantee understanding of all written and spoken instructions, which are in English.
Exclusion
Unable to comply with study procedures or follow-up visits
Has any serious or unstable medical condition or history that in a clinician s assessment implies a cardiovascular, neurological, or physical risk from the study procedures performed to induce negative valence states. This may include chronic systemic disorders that could worsen due to stress (e.g. uncontrolled hypertension, coronary artery disease for example a history of myocardial infarction or stable or unstable angina, or diabetes)
Has any current psychiatric diagnosis (based on SCID or the MINI Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview) or no diagnosis but scores \>=29 on Beck Depression Inventory II or \>=26 on Beck Anxiety Inventory
Meets criteria for diagnosis of any substance-related or addictive disorder, or endorses any kind of problematic gambling behavior or problematic media-based addictive behavior (such as videogames, social-networking, online shopping, etc.)
Regular use of psychoactive medications or psychoactive substances
Regular use of corticosteroids
Is pregnant
Has a major medical condition or medical history that in a clinician s assessment could affect temperature sensitivity, pain thresholds, or ability to comply with study procedures. This may include cardiovascular, autonomic, neurological, psychiatric, or chronic systemic disorders (including but not limited to stroke, blindness, deafness, history of brain damage, neurodegenerative, neurotoxic or demyelinating disorder, or diabetes)
Has a medical condition that in a clinician s assessment might affect somatosensation (e.g., Raynaud s disease, peripheral neuropathy, or circulatory disorder)
Has a current chronic pain condition or has had chronic pain in the past (painful condition lasting more than six months)
Has a dermatological condition such as scars or burns, or has had a tattoo in the testing region within the previous 4 weeks that might influence cutaneous sensibility
Regular and recent use of prescription or over-the-counter medication that has a significant effect on pain or heat perception. These include medications such as centralacting agents such as opiates (morphine, tramadol), antidepressants (amitriptyline, duloxetine, milnacipran), anticonvulsants (gabapentin, pregabalin), anxiolytics (barbiturates, benzodiazepines), hypnotics (zolpidem, sodium oxybate), antipsychotics (valproate, lithium, olanzapine), antimigraine agents (sumatriptan, ergotamine), and muscle relaxants (cyclobenzaprine, carisoprodol). Use of analgesic medications, such as non-steroidal anti-inflammatories, salicylates, and acetaminophen, taken on an as needed basis is acceptable as long as the last dose taken was within 5 half-lives of testing.
Has a condition that in a clinician s assessment could preclude the ability to hold 4-6 hours of fasting or that is associated with a risk of hypoglycemia (such as diabetes, kidney disease, insulinoma, adrenal or pituitary tumors or disorders, or anorexia nervosa)
Is currently engaged in any kind of diet medically- or self-prescribed or endorses a very strong desire to start a diet that involves eliminating or decreasing carbohydrate consumption
Has a history of food allergies such as tree-nut or peanut allergy.
Those with ferromagnetic metal in the cranial cavity or eye (e.g. aneurysm clip, implanted neural stimulator, cochlear implant, ocular foreign body)
Those with an abnormality on a structural MRI
Those with an implanted cardiac pacemaker or auto-defibrillator
Those with an insulin pump
Those with an irremovable body piercing
Pregnancy (based on urine test completed within 24 hours prior to scan)
Left-handed (only for fMRI experiments involving thermal pain stimulation)
What this trial measures
- Value-based decision-making metricsRight after intervention
Value-based metrics such as delay discounting, which is a measure of an individual's preference for small immediate rewards over larger later rewards.
- BOLD signal in decision-making areas ROIRight after intervention
BOLD signal related to decision making tasks