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Virtual reality involves the creation of an interactive three-dimensional virtual world which the user can navigate. This technology is proposed for anxiety disorders as an alternative to the in vivo and imaginative exposure provided in cognitive behavioral therapy, the gold standard psychoterapeutic treatment for this pathology. According to a signifcant number of publications including meta-analysis, virtual reality therapy exposure is at least equivalent to in vivo exposure in specifc phobias, panic disorder with agoraphobia, post-traumatic stress disorder and social phobia. A fundamental feature of the virtual experience is presence, which is commonly defned as the mental experience of "being there", in the virtual world. This concept prompts us to consider virtual reality a therapy beyond exposition, more like an embodied therapy.

Depression is a serious and recurrent condition which can become chronic. As a complement to other therapeutic approaches, therapeutic patient education (TPE) or psychoeducation is effective. TPE groups led by a multidisciplinary hospitalisation team in a psychiatric department are thereby integrated into the global care in order to reduce relapses and improve patients' quality of life., (Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.)

Gaze aversion could be a central component of social phobia. Fear of blushing is a symptom of social anxiety disorder (SAD) but is not yet described as a specific diagnosis in psychiatric classifications. Our research consists of comparing gaze aversion in SAD participants with or without fear of blushing in front of pictures of different emotional faces using an eye tracker. Twenty-six participants with DSM-IV SAD and expressed fear of blushing (SAD+FB) were recruited in addition to twenty-five participants with social phobia and no fear of blushing (SAD-FB). Twenty-four healthy participants aged and sex matched constituted the control group. We studied the number of fixations and the dwell time in the eyes area on the pictures. The results showed gaze avoidance in the SAD-FB group when compared to controls and when compared to the SAD+FB group. However we found no significant difference between SAD+FB and controls. We also observed a correlation between the severity of the phobia and the degree of gaze avoidance across groups. These findings seem to support the claim that social phobia is a heterogeneous disorder. Further research is advised to decide whether fear of blushing can constitute a subtype with specific behavioral characteristics., (Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Although gait disorders were described in schizophrenia, motor imagery of gait has not yet been studied in this pathology. We compared gait, motor imagery of gait and the difference between these two conditions in patients with schizophrenia and healthy age-matched controls. The mean ± standard deviation (S.D.) of Timed Up and Go (TUG), imagined TUG (iTUG) and delta time (i.e.; difference between TUG and iTUG), was used as outcomes. Covariables include Mini Mental State Examination, the Frontal Assessment Battery (FAB), FAB's subitems, the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale and the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS). Seventeen patients with early schizophrenia and 15 healthy age-matched controls were assessed. Schizophrenia patients performed the TUG and the iTUG slower than the controls. Multivariate linear regressions showed that iTUG and delta time were associated with the conflicting instruction of the FAB. The present study provides the first evidence that patients with schizophrenia performed gait and motor imagery of gait slower than healthy controls. These deficits could be in part explained by impaired executive function and specifically by a disturbance in the sensitivity to interference., (Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)