Absence Of Threat Research Articles

Threat, safety, safeness and social safeness 30 years on: Fundamental dimensions and distinctions for mental health and well-being.

In 1993, the British Journal of Clinical Psychology published my paper titled 'Defence and safety: Their function in social behaviour and psychopathology'. The paper highlightsthat to understand people's sensitivity to threat, we also need to understand their ability to identify what is safe. This paper offers an update on these concepts, highlighting distinctions that were implicit but not clearly defined at the time. Hence, the paper seeks to clarify distinctions between: (i) threat detection and response, (ii) safety and safety seeking, (iii) safeness and (iv) their social and non-social functions and forms. Threat detection and response are to prevent or minimize harm (e.g., run from a predator or fire). Safety checking relates to monitoring for the absence and avoidance of threat, while safety seeking links to the destination of the defensive behaviour (e.g., running home). Safety seeking also relates to maintaining vigilance to the appearance of potential harms and doing things believed to avoid harm. Threat-defending and safety checking and seeking are regulated primarily through evolved threat processing systems that monitor the nature, presence, controllability and/or absence of threat (e.g., amygdala and sympathetic nervous system). Safeness uses different monitoring systems via different psychophysiological systems (e.g., prefrontal cortex, parasympathetic system) for the presence of internal and external resources that support threat-coping, risk-taking, resource exploration. Creating brain states that recruit safeness processing can impact how standard evidence-based therapies (e.g., exposure, distress tolerance and reappraisal) are experienced and produce long-term change.

Seven Tesla Evidence for Columnar and Rostral-Caudal Organization of the Human Periaqueductal Gray Response in the Absence of Threat: A Working Memory Study.

The periaqueductal gray (PAG) is a small midbrain structure that surrounds the cerebral aqueduct, regulates brain-body communication, and is often studied for its role in "fight-or-flight" and "freezing" responses to threat. We used ultra-high-field 7 T fMRI to resolve the PAG in humans and distinguish it from the cerebral aqueduct, examining its in vivo function during a working memory task (N = 87). Both mild and moderate cognitive demands elicited spatially similar patterns of whole-brain blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) response, and moderate cognitive demand elicited widespread BOLD increases above baseline in the brainstem. Notably, these brainstem increases were not significantly greater than those in the mild demand condition, suggesting that a subthreshold brainstem BOLD increase occurred for mild cognitive demand as well. Subject-specific masks were group aligned to examine PAG response. In PAG, both mild and moderate demands elicited a well-defined response in ventrolateral PAG, a region thought to be functionally related to anticipated painful threat in humans and nonhuman animals-yet, the present task posed only the most minimal (if any) "threat," with the cognitive tasks used being approximately as challenging as remembering a phone number. These findings suggest that the PAG may play a more general role in visceromotor regulation, even in the absence of threat.

The effects of trait and state anxiety on gait in healthy young adults.

Stable, personality-based (trait), and fluctuating, situational (state) anxiety have both been shown to consume attentional resources and reduce functional cognitive capacity, which may play a role in gait control. However, the role of attention in the relationship between trait and state anxiety has not yet been investigated formally. This study used a virtual reality-threat environment to evaluate whether changes in attention mediate the effects of state and trait anxiety on gait. Thirty adults aged 19-28 completed five walking trials in four conditions: (i) low threat-walking across a virtual plank (0.5m wide) on flat ground; (ii) low threat + dual task (auditory digit monitoring); (iii) high threat-walking across a virtual plank elevated above a deep pit; and (iv) high threat + dual task. Trait anxiety levels were determined by the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, while state anxiety was captured using self-assessment manikins. Higher trait anxiety predicted slower gait velocity and longer time in double support in the high-threat condition compared to low-threat condition (i vs iii), but not when dual tasking, compared to single-task walking, in the absence of threat (ii vs i). Additionally, higher trait anxiety predicted increased step length variability in the high compared to low-threat dual-task condition. Overall, trait anxiety predicts a slower, more cautious gait pattern during threatening conditions while dual tasking during the threat.

Safety engineering of anthropogenic facilities in applied sciences

"Security" is an interdisciplinary concept and appears in various areas of life, science and knowledge describing the reality in which modern man lives, and its aspects are studied by many different scientific disciplines using engineering achievements. In simple terms, safety should be treated as the absence of threat throughout the entire life cycle of an anthropogenic object.
 Help in eliminating or reducing threats can be provided by applied sciences, which are focused on transferring knowledge about the surrounding world, diagnosing and understanding phenomena, problems and social processes, and the combination of achievements in safety engineering and applied sciences can give satisfactory results.
 The article proposes a model that takes into account safety engineering issues in the life cycle of an anthropogenic object using the achievements of applied sciences.

To remember or not to remember: Neural oscillations and ERPs as predictors of intentional associative fear learning

It is widely accepted that impaired safety learning to a safe stimulus is a pathological feature of anxiety disorders. Safety learning refers to learning that a stimulus is associated with the absence of threat. Cognitive mechanisms that underlie successful threat and safety learning are, however, poorly understood. This study aimed to identify various physiological markers, including neural oscillations and event-related potentials (ERPs) that predict successful threat and safety learning. Therefore, to detect potential differences in these markers, we measured EEG in a fear learning framework combined with a subsequent memory paradigm. Thirty-seven participants were asked to memorize a series of associations between faces and an aversive unconditioned stimulus (US) or its omission. We found a decrease of power in the alpha band in occipital brain regions during learning for both threatening (conditioned stimuli, CS+) and safe faces (control stimuli, CS−) that were subsequently remembered to be associated with a US or not. No effects in theta band were found. In regard to ERPs, a late positive potential (LPP) and a P300 component were larger for remembered than for forgotten CS-US associations. The P300 was also enhanced to remembered US and US omissions, thus replicating previous findings. These results point to the importance of cognitive resource allocation as an underlying mechanism of fear learning and electrophysiological measurements as potential biomarkers for successful threat and safety learning.

Threat impairs flexible use of a cognitive map.

Goal-directed behavior requires adaptive systems that respond to environmental demands. In the absence of threat (or presence of reward), individuals can explore many behavioral trajectories, effectively interrogating the environment across multiple dimensions. This leads to flexible, relational memory encoding and retrieval. In the presence of danger, motivation shifts to an imperative state characterized by a narrow focus of attention on threatening information. This impairs flexible, relational memory. We test how these motivational shifts (Murty & Adcock, 2017) affect behavioral flexibility in an ecologically valid setting. Participants learned the structure of maze-like environments and navigated to the location of objects in both safe and threatening contexts. The latter contained a predator that could 'capture' participants, leading to electric shock. After learning, the path to some objects was unpredictably blocked. forcing a detour for which one route was significantly shorter. We predicted that threat would push participants toward an imperative state, leading to less efficient and less flexible navigation. Threat caused participants to take longer paths to goal objects and less efficient detours when obstacles were encountered. Threat-related impairments in detour navigation persisted after controlling for non-detour navigation performance. and non-detour navigation was not a reliable predictor of detour navigation, This suggests a specific impairment in flexible navigation during detours, an impairment unlikely to be explained by more general processes like predator avoidance or divided attention that may be present during non-detour navigation. These results provide ecologically valid evidence that dynamic, observable threats reduce flexible use of cognitive maps to guide behavior.

Efficacy of a novel safety behavior elimination intervention for posttraumatic stress symptoms: Results from a randomized controlled trial

BackgroundIndividuals with posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) use a variety of safety behaviors: strategies intended to prevent, avoid, or manage distress in anxiety-provoking situations. However, when used in the absence of threat, safety behaviors maintain PTSS by preventing collection of disconfirming evidence about potential danger. Thus, individuals with PTSS may benefit from eliminating their maladaptive safety behavior use. MethodsThe current study evaluated a brief, computer-based safety behavior reduction intervention, Safety Behavior Elimination for Traumatic Stress (SBETS). Seventy-five participants were recruited based on trauma exposure and elevated PTSS. Participants were randomly assigned to the SBETS condition or a physical health control. In the intervention, participants selected two behaviors to reduce or eliminate over the coming month. Participants were given reminders to reduce those behaviors twice a week, and treatment outcomes were assessed at two weeks and one month following the intervention. ResultsHierarchical regressions demonstrated that while participants in the two conditions did not differ in their reported safety behavior use at follow-up, individuals in the SBETS condition reported significantly lower month 1 PTSS (Cohen's d = 0.56). While week 2 safety behavior use and week 2 negative affect did not mediate the relationship between treatment condition and month 1 PTSS, this relationship was fully mediated by week 2 use of the two behaviors selected for elimination. LimitationsThe current study was limited by its homogenous sample and brief follow-up period. ConclusionsResults suggest that SBETS has a significant effect on PTSS, and may represent an acceptable, accessible treatment option for trauma survivors.

A Systematic Review of the Inter-individual Differences in Avoidance Learning

Avoidance is typically adaptive given it prevents threat. However, avoidance becomes maladaptive when it is executed out of proportion of threat (i.e., excessive or insufficient avoidance), persists in the absence of threat, or excessively generalizes to other innocuous situations. Although there has been an increase in research in these different processes of maladaptive avoidance, the role of inter-individual differences in these avoidance processes receives less research attention, despite its theoretical and clinical importance. In this systematic review, we summarized the role of inter-individual traits that relate to risk or resilient factors for anxiety-related disorders, trauma-and stressor-related disorders, obsessive-compulsive related disorders, pain related disorders, eating-related disorders, and affective disorders. A majority of the inter-individual differences had an apparent mixed or null effect on the different processes of avoidance. We discussed this lack of evidence of inter-individual differences on avoidance due to a lack of methodological and/or analytical consensus in the field, in addition to a lack of integration of recent findings into existing theories. Recommendations for future research are discussed, with a focus on examining the conditions or experimental parameters for certain inter-individual traits to manifest their effects on avoidance, identifying the nuances of methodological and/or inter-individual differences in avoidance, and a call for integrating recent preliminary findings into existing theories.

Reducing avoidance of learnt fear: Extinction of an imminent threat signal partly decreases costly avoidance to a distal threat signal

In the interplay of fear and avoidance, not only imminent threat signals that directly predict potential threat evoke avoidance, but also distal threat signals that predict these imminent threat signals. Avoidance of learnt fear refers to avoidance to a distal threat signal that prevents the occurrence of an imminent threat signal. In clinical anxiety, it is often pathological given its persistence in the absence of threat and the impairments it inflicts. The current study examined whether fear extinction to an imminent threat signal would effectively reduce avoidance of learnt fear in a sensory preconditioning procedure. Three neutral preconditioning stimuli (PSs), serving as distal threat or safety signals, were paired with three neutral to-be conditioned stimuli (CSs), serving as imminent threat or safety signals. After assessing baseline levels of costly avoidance to the PSs, two CSs were paired with threat. One of these CSs then ceased to predict threat during extinction training. In test, participants showed limited avoidance to the PS that signaled the extinguished CS, however, the level of avoidance was still stronger compared to a PS that signaled a safety CS. Results suggest that exposure to an imminent threat signal partly reduces avoidance to a distal threat.

Lateral septum modulates cortical state to tune responsivity to threat stimuli

Sudden unexpected environmental changes capture attention and, when perceived as potentially dangerous, evoke defensive behavioral states. Perturbations of the lateral septum (LS) can produce extreme hyperdefensiveness even to innocuous stimuli, but how this structure influences stimulus-evoked defensive responses and threat perception remains unclear. Here, we show that Crhr2-expressing neurons in mouse LS exhibit phasic activation upon detection of threatening but not rewarding stimuli. Threat-stimulus-driven activity predicts the probability but not vigor or type of defensive behavior evoked. Although necessary for and sufficient to potentiate stimulus-triggered defensive responses, LSCrhr2 neurons do not promote specific behaviors. Rather, their stimulation elicits negative valence and physiological arousal. Moreover, LSCrhr2 activity tracks brain state fluctuations and drives cortical activation and rapid awakening in the absence of threat. Together, our findings suggest that LS directs bottom-up modulation of cortical function to evoke preparatory defensive internal states and selectively enhance responsivity to threat-related stimuli.

The neurobiology of Pavlovian safety learning: Towards an acquisition-expression framework

Safety learning creates associations between conditional stimuli and the absence of threat. Studies of human fear conditioning have accumulated evidence for the neural signatures of safety over various paradigms, aligning on several common brain systems. While these systems are often interpreted as underlying safety learning in a generic sense, they may instead reflect the expression of learned safety, pertaining to processes of fear inhibition, positive affect, and memory. Animal models strongly suggest these can be separable from neural circuits implicated in the conditioning process itself (or safety acquisition). While acquisition-expression distinctions are ubiquitous in behavioural science, this lens has not been applied to safety learning, which remains a novel area in the field. In this mini-review, we overview findings from prevalent safety paradigms in humans, and synthesise these with insights from animal models to propose that the neurobiology of safety learning be conceptualised along an acquisition-expression model, with the aim of stimulating richer brain-based characterisations of this important process.

Is threat detection Black and White? Race effects in threat-related perceptual decision-making.

There is a vast literature base indicating that people respond differently to Black and White individuals based on differential perceptions of threat. As facial affect is a fundamental way that individuals communicate their emotional state, studies have examined differences in how Black and White threatening facial expressions are perceived. However, perceptual decisions regarding threatening and neutral stimuli often occur in familiar contexts or in environments where explicit cues indicate the presence or absence of threat. Furthermore, these decisions often occur in "noisy" (i.e., ambiguous) environments where the quality of sensory evidence is poor, requiring us to rely on perceptual "sets" or expectations to interpret such evidence. Therefore, in the present study we used a two-alternative perceptual decision-making task in which participants used threatening and neutral cue-elicited perceptual sets to discriminate between subsequently presented threatening and neutral Black and White faces. Threatening cues led to a greater tendency to decide that both Black and White faces were threatening, as well as faster and greater discriminability between threatening and neutral Black and White faces. However, race-related differences revealed that, following both cue types, discriminability between threatening and neutral Black faces was worse compared to White faces. Therefore, using a paradigm that is ecologically valid, our findings highlight the importance of examining basic aspects of visual perception to understand race-related differences in threat-related perceptual decision-making. Furthermore, these findings emphasize the importance of anticipatory top-down factors when making perceptual decisions about the presence or absence of threat in faces of different races. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Cortico-Striatal Activity Characterizes Human Safety Learning via Pavlovian Conditioned Inhibition.

Safety learning generates associative links between neutral stimuli and the absence of threat, promoting the inhibition of fear and security-seeking behaviors. Precisely how safety learning is mediated at the level of underlying brain systems, particularly in humans, remains unclear. Here, we integrated a novel Pavlovian conditioned inhibition task with ultra-high field (7 Tesla) fMRI to examine the neural basis of safety learning in 49 healthy participants. In our task, participants were conditioned to two safety signals: a conditioned inhibitor that predicted threat omission when paired with a known threat signal (A+/AX-), and a standard safety signal that generally predicted threat omission (BC-). Both safety signals evoked equivalent autonomic and subjective learning responses but diverged strongly in terms of underlying brain activation (PFDR whole-brain corrected). The conditioned inhibitor was characterized by more prominent activation of the dorsal striatum, anterior insular, and dorsolateral PFC compared with the standard safety signal, whereas the latter evoked greater activation of the ventromedial PFC, posterior cingulate, and hippocampus, among other regions. Further analyses of the conditioned inhibitor indicated that its initial learning was characterized by consistent engagement of dorsal striatal, midbrain, thalamic, premotor, and prefrontal subregions. These findings suggest that safety learning via conditioned inhibition involves a distributed cortico-striatal circuitry, separable from broader cortical regions involved with processing standard safety signals (e.g., CS-). This cortico-striatal system could represent a novel neural substrate of safety learning, underlying the initial generation of "stimulus-safety" associations, distinct from wider cortical correlates of safety processing, which facilitate the behavioral outcomes of learning.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Identifying safety is critical for maintaining adaptive levels of anxiety, but the neural mechanisms of human safety learning remain unclear. Using 7 Tesla fMRI, we compared learning-related brain activity for a conditioned inhibitor, which actively predicted threat omission, and a standard safety signal (CS-), which was passively unpaired with threat. The inhibitor engaged an extended circuitry primarily featuring the dorsal striatum, along with thalamic, midbrain, and premotor/PFC regions. The CS- exclusively involved cortical safety-related regions observed in basic safety conditioning, such as the vmPFC. These findings extend current models to include learning-specific mechanisms for encoding stimulus-safety associations, which might be distinguished from expression-related cortical mechanisms. These insights may suggest novel avenues for targeting dysfunctional safety learning in psychopathology.

Avoidance of learnt fear: Models, potential mechanisms, and future directions

Avoiding stimuli that were previously associated with threat is essential for adaptive functioning, but excessive avoidance that persists in the absence of threat can turn dysfunctional and results in severe impairments. Fear and avoidance conditioning models have substantially contributed to the understanding of safety behaviors towards learnt fear stimuli. Safety behaviors are executed in the presence of a feared stimulus to prevent the upcoming threat and are well-established in laboratory models. Avoidance of learnt fear, i.e., avoidance of the feared stimulus itself, is typically initiated before the onset of a feared stimulus: individuals oftentimes avoid fear stimuli to prevent negative emotions evoked by them or ultimately the associated threat. Avoidance of learnt fear is surprisingly understudied despite its prevalence in pathological anxiety. The current overview proposes potential behavioral mechanisms and neural circuits of avoidance of learnt fear in humans, and discusses findings and paradigms suitable for examining it. Specifically, higher-order conditioning, decision making paradigms, and context-cue conditioning investigate distinct forms of avoidance of learnt fear. We also discuss the clinical prospects and future directions of research in avoidance of learnt fear.

Salt marsh restoration: an overview of techniques and success indicators.

Coastal wetlands including salt marshes are among the most productive ecosystems on Earth. They are known for improving the quality of coastal water and provisioning coastal fisheries. However, this ecosystem is under potential threat due to urban coastal land reclamation, limited sediment supply, increased nutrient/eutrophication, and sea level rise. Therefore, restoration efforts to protect the degraded salt marsh habitat are considerably increasing worldwide. In this paper, we present an overview of salt marsh restoration techniques and success indicators. Published scientific literature in English language was collected by searching the most relevant keywords from popular search engines, namely, Google Scholar, Scopus, and Mendeley to get the information about salt marsh restoration techniques and success indicators. This study comprehensively reviewed data from 78 peer-reviewed papers. Results indicated that much of the salt marsh was restored through assisted abiotic strategies (e.g., recovery of tidal exchange, managed realignment, and sediment level amendment). A total of 214 indicators were found, spanning over six major ecological attributes such as structural diversity, ecosystem functions, physical conditions, species composition, external exchange, and absence of threat. Author keywords analysis revealed several hotspots for recent research (e.g., 16s rRNA, fungi, microbial communities, carbon accumulation, and blue carbon). This paper proposes a model for restoring degraded salt marsh, as well as tracking their success.The information presented here will assist the marine ecosystem restoration practitioners in getting a comprehensive understanding of salt marsh restoration success evaluation.

Insights into Safety and Connection in Relationships Provided by Psychoanalytic Treatment of Autistic Individuals

ABSTRACT The creation of safety in a relationship is a prerequisite for the risk-taking required for developmental progress and therapeutic change. Psychoanalysts typically speak of safety in the analytic relationship in terms of verbal exploration of sources of the patient’s anxiety, and the analyst’s role in maintaining the frame. Yet it is clear that safety is not the same as the absence of threat, but is instead based on psychological safety as well as physical safety. Psychological safety – or safety with another person – requires the developmental capacity making social connections. The fields of infant research and neurodevelopment – particularly the work of Beatrice Beebe and Stephen Porges – have contributed significantly to this critical aspect of analytic work through their explications of stress regulation. Disorders of self-regulation – i.e. impairments in the capacity to manage stress and experience safety – are central to the neurodevelopmental disorder of autism. In addition, language and symbolization are typically compromised in individuals on the autism spectrum. Therefore, therapists working with individuals on the autistic spectrum must explore alternatives to language and symbols for creating a safe environment. These alternative methods of communication are what I call the “music and dance” of therapeutic action. In this article I will first discuss some relevant contributions from research in infancy and neurodevelopment. I will then use a clinical illustration of analytic work with a child on the autistic spectrum to demonstrate nonverbal and largely implicit bodily means of mutual regulation with a patient. This example not only applies to the treatment of autism, but also provides more general insights into methods of creating safety in the analytic dyad.

Costly habitual avoidance is reduced by concurrent goal-directed approach in a modified devaluation paradigm

Avoidance habits potentially contribute to maintaining maladaptive, costly avoidance behaviors that persist in the absence of threat. However, experimental evidence about costly habitual avoidance is scarce. In two experiments, we tested whether extensively trained avoidance impairs the subsequent goal-directed approach of rewards. Healthy participants were extensively trained to avoid an aversive outcome by performing simple responses to distinct full-screen color stimuli. After the subsequent devaluation of the aversive outcome, participants received monetary rewards for correct responses to neutral object pictures, which were presented on top of the same full-screen colors. These approach responses were either compatible or incompatible with habitual avoidance responses. Notably, the full-screen colors were not relevant to inform approach responses. In Experiment 1, participants were not instructed about post-devaluation stimulus-response-reward contingencies. Accuracy was lower in habit-incompatible than in habit-compatible trials, indicating costly avoidance, whereas reaction times did not differ. In Experiment 2, contingencies were explicitly instructed. Accuracy differences disappeared, but reaction times were slower in habit-incompatible than in habit-compatible trials, indicating low-cost habitual avoidance tendencies. These findings suggest a small but consistent impact of habitual avoidance tendencies on subsequent goal-directed approach. Costly habitual responding could, however, be inhibited when competing goal-directed approach was easily realizable.

They're watching you: the impact of social evaluation and anxiety on threat-related perceptual decision-making.

In day-to-day social interactions, we frequently use cues and contextual knowledge to make perceptual decisions regarding the presence or absence of threat in facial expressions. Such perceptual decisions are often made in socially evaluative contexts. However, the influence of such contexts on perceptual discrimination of threatening and neutral expressions has not been examined empirically. Furthermore, it is unclear how individual differences in anxiety interact with socially evaluative contexts to influence threat-related perceptual decision-making. In the present study, participants completed a 2-alternative forced choice perceptual decision-making task in which they used threatening and neutral cues to discriminate between threatening and neutral faces while being socially evaluated by purported peers or not. Perceptual sensitivity and reaction time were measured. Individual differences in state anxiety were assessed immediately after the task. In the presence of social evaluation, higher state anxiety was associated with worse perceptual sensitivity, i.e., worse discrimination of threatening and neutral faces. These findings suggest that individual differences in anxiety interact with social evaluation to impair the use of threatening cues to discriminate between threatening and neutral expressions. Such impairment in perceptual decision-making may contribute to maladaptive social behavior that often accompanies evaluative social contexts.

COVID-19 PANDEMIC IN THE CONTEXT OF HUMAN SECURITY

The phenomenon of human security aims to combine security with human rights and freedoms as a product of the changing security perception of the West after the Cold War. The concept of human security has transformed security from the perception of “only the absence of threat” to a perception in which elements such as “fears and needs” are also taken into account. However, the new circumstance affected by COVID-19 and the measures taken to combat the pandemic have enforced us to experience a period in which human security is eroded, anxiety becomes the dominant emotion, dif􀏐iculties arise in meeting the existing needs as well as the new needs that are dif􀏐icult to meet. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the concept of human security has been abandoned and the classical protective-restrictive security approach has been adopted due to the wideness of the concept and its dif􀏐icult nature to de􀏐ine, which has criticised many times. In this process, sources such as the hierarchy of rights, the sociality of responsibility and the limit of freedom have constituted the legitimacy of the restrictive measures that had been taken. These extraordinary conditions, which are deemed appropriate for the limitation of rights and freedoms, are listed as a legitimate reason for the limitation of freedom in many legal texts. Another point that provides the legitimacy of struggle in extraordinary situations such as epidemic is the rarity of such cases. However, the world is faced with a problem that will destroy this source of legitimacy. While the world is changing rapidly, viruses that cause epidemics are not at a 􀏐ixed point. The rapid evolution of viruses and the spread of epidemics indicate the possibility of similar the outbreaks like the COVID-19 pandemic in the near future. For this reason, it will not be suf􀏐icient for concepts such as human security to be damaged in such extraordinary situations and to be amended again in the subsequent normalization processes. This study aims to analyze the human security phenomenon, the erosion that it has experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic, its underlying sources of legitimacy and the possible problems to be encountered.

Absence Makes the Mind Grow Fonder: Reconceptualizing Studies of Safety Learning in Translational Research on Anxiety.

Overgeneralized fear (OGF), or indiscriminate fear responses to signals of threat and nonthreat, is a well-studied cognitive mechanism in human anxiety. Anxiety-related OGF has been studied primarily through fear-learning paradigms and conceptualized as overly exaggerated learning of cues signaling imminent threat. However, the role of safety learning in OGF has not only received much less empirical attention but has been fundamentally conceptualized as learning about the absence of threat rather than the presence of safety. As a result, the relative contributions of exaggerated fear learning and weakened safety learning to anxiety-related OGF remain poorly understood, as do the potentially unique biological and behavioral underpinnings of safety learning. The present review outlines these gaps by, first, summarizing animal and human research on safety learning related to anxiety and OGF. Second, we outline innovations in methods to tease apart unique biological and behavioral contributions of safety learning to OGF. Lastly, we describe clinical and treatment implications of this framework for translational research relevant to human anxiety.