Tetris Intervention Following Subliminal Reactivation for Intrusive Memories

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is characterized by recurrent, intrusive memories of traumatic events that cause significant distress and functional impairment. Although trauma-focused treatments are effective, they typically require deliberate recollection of traumatic experiences, which can be distressing and may contribute to treatment avoidance or dropout. In previous experimental studies conducted with healthy participants, we demonstrated that unconscious reactivation of trauma-related cues, followed-after a brief delay corresponding to the memory reconsolidation window-by a visuospatial interference task (Tetris gameplay), reduced the frequency and emotional intensity of intrusive memories. These findings suggest that memory representations may be modifiable during reconsolidation without requiring conscious recall. Building on this work, the present randomized controlled trial (RCT) aims to evaluate the clinical efficacy and tolerability of this reconsolidation-based intervention in trauma-exposed individuals experiencing five or more intrusive memories per week.

NCT Number	NCT07495917
Lead Sponsor	Shaanxi Normal University
Conditions	Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), Intrusive Memories of Traumatic Event(s)
Enrollment	106 participants
Start Date	2026-04-10
Primary Completion	2027-04-10 (estimated)
Study Completion	2027-07-30 (estimated)
Updated on ClinicalTrials.gov	2026-04-06