Kevin Clancy awarded a Joseph & Susan Gatto Foundation Award. This project aims to identify a mechanistic link between the vivid sensory features of trauma intrusions and harmful coping behaviors, like substance use. Combining EMAs of intrusion properties and coping behaviors with fMRI and MRS, Kevin will test the hypothesis that maladaptive coping is driven by attempts to dampen the sensory vividness of intrusions, and that this vividness is driven by sensory cortical disinhibition. Findings will inform mechanism-based interventions targeting the sensory vividness of intrusions as a maintaining factor of harmful substance use in trauma-exposed adults.
Congratulations, Kevin!