Prosocial Behaviour Reduces Unwanted Intrusions of Experimental Traumatic Memories

Memory intrusions of traumatic events is a hallmark symptom of PTSD. Existing manipulations to reduce trauma intrusions involve trauma re-exposure. Across two pre-registered experiments, we tested a novel socio-emotional manipulation of prosocial engagement involving no trauma re-exposure and found that, compared to non-prosocial tasks, prosocial behaviour reduced daily-life trauma intrusions.