Randomized Clinical Trial of Smartphone-Based Exposure of Dental Anxiety

1. Recruitment efforts will be made in the community via advertisements and online advertisements (e.g., Craigslist, Facebook).

2. Prospective participants will contact the investigators via email or by calling the study phone number listed on the advertisements.

3. Once a participant indicates interest by contacting study personnel, a 5-minute screening interview will be conducted with the prospective participant using the screening questionnaire to ensure eligibility criteria are met. For those who do not qualify or agree to participate, the age and reason for non-qualification or declination to participate will be recorded; any other data will be destroyed by shredding or electronic shredding. For those who do qualify, name and contact information will be kept confidential and maintained in a locked room.

4. After written agreement to enlist in the study, participants are randomly assigned to group (i.e., treatment or control) by previously prepared sealed opaque envelopes.

5. Participants will complete the demographic questionnaire, the Dental Fear Survey, and the investigator will complete the specific phobia section of the ADIS-5 with the participant.

6. Then a Behavioral Avoidance Task will be conducted with the participants

7. One-minute baseline, in which the participant sat quietly.

8. Then nine dental-related steps will be completed each lasted 30 seconds, and a SUDS rating was collected at each step.

9. After completing the Behavioral Avoidance Task, the investigator provides a 15-minute demonstration to the participants.

10. The control group watched a video on their smartphone about smartphone capabilities as an attention control.

11. The treatment group was shown how to conduct self-directed exposure therapy and rate SUDS on their smartphone.

i. The video is a typical preventive visit to the dentist, including walking into the dental office, being called back for treatment by the dental assistant, sitting in the dental chair, and seeing the hygienist perform a teeth cleaning.

ii. The video is presented in a first and third person perspective, and the order is randomly assigned (e.g., view the first person perspective video during week 1 of treatment and then third person perspective during week 2 of treatment). 8. Researcher will model how to rate SUDS prior to watching the exposure video, how to access the exposure video, how to rate actual SUDS experienced during the video, and how to either continue to the next video or stop the exposure session.