Don't some people who have, say, a social anxiety disorder already take a dose of propranolol one hour before a social event? So isn't this discovery already widely known among propranolol users?
Yes, but this research (even though similar research occurred prior) is about "guided therapy" where the therapist is trying to specifically trigger a memory but also help the patient figure out new coping strategies and turning those new coping strategies into habits so the automatic anxiety induced habit is not the only coping mechanism.
Taking a dose of propranolol prior to a stressful situation is a different type of environment with different goals for how will interact with the environment.
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This is not new research for we had replication research of the connection with specific Beta receptors in the amygdala and the hippocampus in 2004 with fear and Yadda, Yadda, Yadda... with prior breakthrough research happening even earlier. But there are so many interactions with so many systems that research after 2004 is about learning the "best practices and best applications" of how to treat patients. Science and Medicine is a continuous undertaken process. This researcher M Soeter has a dozen important scientific papers on the detail of this process from 2009 to 2018.
