201
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Brunetti M, Sepede G, Ferretti A, Mingoia G, Romani GL, Babiloni C. Response inhibition failure to visual stimuli paired with a "single-type" stressor in PTSD patients: an fMRI pilot study. Brain Res Bull 2015; 114:20-30. [PMID: 25791360 DOI: 10.1016/j.brainresbull.2015.03.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/11/2014] [Revised: 01/28/2015] [Accepted: 03/05/2015] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
Patients with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) tend to misinterpret innocuous stimuli as potential threats, possibly due to a conditioning provoked by traumatic episodes. Previous neuroimaging evidence has shown an abnormal activation of the amygdala and prefrontal cortex in PTSD patients during fear conditioning and extinction. Nevertheless, the effects of a single-type adverse stressor on that circuit remain poorly explored. We tested the hypothesis that a single-type adverse episode is able to affect the prefrontal cortex and amygdala response to conditioned stimuli. To test this hypothesis, fMRI recordings were performed in PTSD patients and trauma-exposed controls during the observation of neutral and negative paired or non-paired pictures with an adverse stimulus by means of a single association. Results showed that left amygdala activation during negative reinforced stimuli was correlated with the score of PTSD clinical scale across all subjects. Furthermore, in the traumatized non-PTSD group, the activation of the dorso-medial prefrontal cortex and bilateral amygdala was lower during the observation of the reinforced (CS(+)) versus non-reinforced pictures (CS(-)) in response to emotionally negative stimuli. This was not the case in the PTSD patients. These results suggest that in PTSD patients, a single-episode conditioning unveils the failure of an inhibitory mechanism moderating the activity of the prefrontal cortex and amygdala in response to adverse and neutral stimuli.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marcella Brunetti
- Institute of Advanced Biomedical Technologies, University of Chieti, Italy; Department of Neuroscience, Imaging & Clinical Science, University of Chieti, Italy.
| | - Gianna Sepede
- Institute of Advanced Biomedical Technologies, University of Chieti, Italy; Department of Neuroscience, Imaging & Clinical Science, University of Chieti, Italy; Department of Basic Medical Sciences, Neurosciences and Sense Organs, University "A. Moro", Bari, Italy
| | - Antonio Ferretti
- Institute of Advanced Biomedical Technologies, University of Chieti, Italy; Department of Neuroscience, Imaging & Clinical Science, University of Chieti, Italy
| | | | - Gian Luca Romani
- Institute of Advanced Biomedical Technologies, University of Chieti, Italy; Department of Neuroscience, Imaging & Clinical Science, University of Chieti, Italy
| | - Claudio Babiloni
- Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, University of Rome "La Sapienza", Rome, Italy; IRCCS San Raffaele Pisana, Rome, Italy
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202
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Dincheva I, Drysdale AT, Hartley CA, Johnson DC, Jing D, King EC, Ra S, Gray JM, Yang R, DeGruccio AM, Huang C, Cravatt BF, Glatt CE, Hill MN, Casey BJ, Lee FS. FAAH genetic variation enhances fronto-amygdala function in mouse and human. Nat Commun 2015; 6:6395. [PMID: 25731744 PMCID: PMC4351757 DOI: 10.1038/ncomms7395] [Citation(s) in RCA: 202] [Impact Index Per Article: 22.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/22/2014] [Accepted: 01/23/2015] [Indexed: 01/19/2023] Open
Abstract
Cross-species studies enable rapid translational discovery and produce the broadest impact when both mechanism and phenotype are consistent across organisms. We developed a knock-in mouse that biologically recapitulates a common human mutation in the gene for fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH) (C385A; rs324420), the primary catabolic enzyme for the endocannabinoid anandamide. This common polymorphism impacts the expression and activity of FAAH, thereby increasing anandamide levels. Here, we show that the genetic knock-in mouse and human variant allele carriers exhibit parallel alterations in biochemisty, neurocircuitry, and behavior. Specifically, there is reduced FAAH expression associated with the variant allele that selectively enhances fronto-amygdala connectivity and fear extinction learning, and decreases anxiety-like behaviors. These results suggest a gain-of-function in fear regulation and may indicate for whom and for what anxiety symptoms FAAH inhibitors or exposure-based therapies will be most efficacious, bridging an important translational gap between the mouse and human.
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Affiliation(s)
- Iva Dincheva
- 1] Department of Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA [2] Department of Pharmacology, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - Andrew T Drysdale
- Sackler Institute for Developmental Psychobiology, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - Catherine A Hartley
- Sackler Institute for Developmental Psychobiology, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - David C Johnson
- Sackler Institute for Developmental Psychobiology, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - Deqiang Jing
- Department of Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - Elizabeth C King
- 1] Department of Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA [2] Department of Pharmacology, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - Stephen Ra
- Department of Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - J Megan Gray
- Hotchkiss Brain Institute and Mathison Centre for Mental Health Research and Education, Departments of Cell Biology and Anatomy &Psychiatry, University of Calgary, 3330 Hospital Drive NW, Calgary AB Canada T2N4N1
| | - Ruirong Yang
- Department of Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - Ann Marie DeGruccio
- inGenious Targeting Laboratory, 2200 Smithtown Avenue, Ronkonkoma, New York 11779, USA
| | - Chienchun Huang
- Department of Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - Benjamin F Cravatt
- Department of Chemical Physiology, The Scripps Research Institute, 10550 North Torrey Pines Road, La Jolla, California 92037, USA
| | - Charles E Glatt
- Department of Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - Matthew N Hill
- Hotchkiss Brain Institute and Mathison Centre for Mental Health Research and Education, Departments of Cell Biology and Anatomy &Psychiatry, University of Calgary, 3330 Hospital Drive NW, Calgary AB Canada T2N4N1
| | - B J Casey
- 1] Department of Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA [2] Department of Pharmacology, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
| | - Francis S Lee
- 1] Department of Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA [2] Department of Pharmacology, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA [3] Sackler Institute for Developmental Psychobiology, Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University, 1300 York Avenue, New York, New York 10065, USA
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203
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Stoeckel MC, Esser RW, Gamer M, Kalisch R, Büchel C, von Leupoldt A. Amygdala response to anticipation of dyspnea is modulated by 5-HTTLPR genotype. Psychophysiology 2015; 52:973-6. [PMID: 25684362 DOI: 10.1111/psyp.12417] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/30/2014] [Accepted: 01/15/2015] [Indexed: 12/16/2022]
Abstract
Dyspnea anticipation and perception varies largely between individuals. To investigate whether genetic factors related to negative affect such as the 5-HTTLPR polymorphism impact this variability, we investigated healthy, 5-HTTLPR stratified volunteers using resistive load induced dyspnea together with fMRI. Alternating blocks of severe and mild dyspnea ("perception") were differentially cued ("anticipation") and followed by intensity and unpleasantness ratings. In addition, volunteers indicated their anticipatory fear during the anticipation periods. There were no genotype-based group differences concerning dyspnea intensity and unpleasantness or brain activation during perception of severe vs. mild dyspnea. However, in risk allele carriers, higher anticipatory fear was paralleled by stronger amygdala activation during anticipation of severe vs. mild dyspnea. These results suggest a role of the 5-HTTLPR genotype in fearful dyspnea anticipation.
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Affiliation(s)
- M Cornelia Stoeckel
- Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany
| | - Roland W Esser
- Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany
| | - Matthias Gamer
- Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany
| | - Raffael Kalisch
- Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany.,Neuroimaging Center Mainz (NIC), Focus Program Translational Neuroscience (FTN), Johannes Gutenberg University Medical Center, Mainz, Germany
| | - Christian Büchel
- Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany
| | - Andreas von Leupoldt
- Department of Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany.,Research Group Health Psychology, University of Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
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204
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Gold AL, Morey RA, McCarthy G. Amygdala-prefrontal cortex functional connectivity during threat-induced anxiety and goal distraction. Biol Psychiatry 2015; 77:394-403. [PMID: 24882566 PMCID: PMC4349396 DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2014.03.030] [Citation(s) in RCA: 124] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/20/2013] [Revised: 03/14/2014] [Accepted: 03/17/2014] [Indexed: 01/20/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Anxiety produced by environmental threats can impair goal-directed processing and is associated with a range of psychiatric disorders, particularly when aversive events occur unpredictably. The prefrontal cortex (PFC) is thought to implement controls that minimize performance disruptions from threat-induced anxiety and goal distraction by modulating activity in regions involved in threat detection, such as the amygdala. The inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), and ventromedial PFC (vmPFC) have been linked to the regulation of anxiety during threat exposure. We developed a paradigm to determine if threat-induced anxiety would enhance functional connectivity between the amygdala and IFG, OFC, and vmPFC. METHODS Healthy adults performed a computer-gaming style task involving capturing prey and evading predators to optimize monetary rewards while exposed to the threat of unpredictable shock. Psychophysiological recording (n = 26) and functional magnetic resonance imaging scanning (n = 17) were collected during the task in separate cohorts. Task-specific changes in functional connectivity with the amygdala were examined using psychophysiological interaction analysis. RESULTS Threat exposure resulted in greater arousal measured by increased skin conductance but did not influence performance (i.e., monetary losses or rewards). Greater functional connectivity between the right amygdala and bilateral IFG, OFC, vmPFC, anterior cingulate cortex, and frontopolar cortex was associated with threat exposure. CONCLUSIONS Exposure to unpredictable threat modulates amygdala-PFC functional connectivity that may help maintain performance when experiencing anxiety induced by threat. Our paradigm is well-suited to explore the neural underpinnings of the anxiety response to unpredictable threat in patients with various anxiety disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andrea L Gold
- Department of Psychology (ALG, GM), Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut
| | - Rajendra A Morey
- Mental Illness Research Education and Clinical Center for Post Deployment Mental Health (RAM, GM), Durham Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina; Duke-University of North Carolina Brain Imaging and Analysis Center (RAM), Duke University, Durham, North Carolina; Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences (RAM), Duke University, Durham, North Carolina
| | - Gregory McCarthy
- Department of Psychology (ALG, GM), Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut; Mental Illness Research Education and Clinical Center for Post Deployment Mental Health (RAM, GM), Durham Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Duke University, Durham, North Carolina.
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205
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Robinson OJ, Bond RL, Roiser JP. The impact of stress on financial decision-making varies as a function of depression and anxiety symptoms. PeerJ 2015; 3:e770. [PMID: 25699215 PMCID: PMC4330902 DOI: 10.7717/peerj.770] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/03/2014] [Accepted: 01/26/2015] [Indexed: 01/01/2023] Open
Abstract
Stress can precipitate the onset of mood and anxiety disorders. This may occur, at least in part, via a modulatory effect of stress on decision-making. Some individuals are, however, more resilient to the effects of stress than others. The mechanisms underlying such vulnerability differences are nevertheless unknown. In this study we attempted to begin quantifying individual differences in vulnerability by exploring the effect of experimentally induced stress on decision-making. The threat of unpredictable shock was used to induce stress in healthy volunteers (N = 47) using a within-subjects, within-session design, and its impact on a financial decision-making task (the Iowa Gambling Task) was assessed alongside anxious and depressive symptomatology. As expected, participants learned to select advantageous decks and avoid disadvantageous decks. Importantly, we found that stress provoked a pattern of harm-avoidant behaviour (decreased selection of disadvantageous decks) in individuals with low levels of trait anxiety. By contrast, individuals with high trait anxiety demonstrated the opposite pattern: stress-induced risk-seeking (increased selection of disadvantageous decks). These contrasting influences of stress depending on mood and anxiety symptoms might provide insight into vulnerability to common mental illness. In particular, we speculate that those who adopt a more harm-avoidant strategy may be better able to regulate their exposure to further environmental stress, reducing their susceptibility to mood and anxiety disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Rebecca L Bond
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London , UK
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206
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Andreatta M, Glotzbach-Schoon E, Mühlberger A, Schulz SM, Wiemer J, Pauli P. Initial and sustained brain responses to contextual conditioned anxiety in humans. Cortex 2015; 63:352-63. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cortex.2014.09.014] [Citation(s) in RCA: 51] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/10/2014] [Revised: 06/11/2014] [Accepted: 09/16/2014] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
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207
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Eisenberger NI. Social Pain and the Brain: Controversies, Questions, and Where to Go from Here. Annu Rev Psychol 2015; 66:601-29. [DOI: 10.1146/annurev-psych-010213-115146] [Citation(s) in RCA: 185] [Impact Index Per Article: 20.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Naomi I. Eisenberger
- Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, California 90095-1563;
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208
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Abstract
Entering a state of anxious anticipation triggers widespread changes across large-scale networks in the brain. The temporal aspects of this transition into an anxious state are poorly understood. To address this question, an instructed threat of shock paradigm was used while recording functional MRI in humans to measure how activation and functional connectivity change over time across the salience, executive, and task-negative networks and how they interact with key regions implicated in emotional processing; the amygdala and bed nucleus of the stria terminalis (BNST). Transitions into threat blocks were associated with transient responses in regions of the salience network and sustained responses in a putative BNST site, among others. Multivariate network measures of communication were computed, revealing changes to network organization during transient and sustained periods of threat, too. For example, the salience network exhibited a transient increase in network efficiency followed by a period of sustained decreased efficiency. The amygdala became more central to network function (as assessed via betweenness centrality) during threat across all participants, and the extent to which the BNST became more central during threat depended on self-reported anxiety. Together, our study unraveled a progression of responses and network-level changes due to sustained threat. In particular, our results reveal how network organization unfolds with time during periods of anxious anticipation.
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209
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Klucken T, Kruse O, Wehrum-Osinsky S, Hennig J, Schweckendiek J, Stark R. Impact of COMT Val158Met-polymorphism on appetitive conditioning and amygdala/prefrontal effective connectivity. Hum Brain Mapp 2014; 36:1093-101. [PMID: 25394948 DOI: 10.1002/hbm.22688] [Citation(s) in RCA: 32] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/25/2014] [Revised: 10/10/2014] [Accepted: 11/03/2014] [Indexed: 01/19/2023] Open
Abstract
Appetitive conditioning is an important mechanism for the development, maintenance, and treatment of psychiatric disorders like substance abuse. Therefore, it is important to identify genetic variations, which impact appetitive conditioning. It has been suggested that the Val(158) Met-polymorphism in the Catechol-O-Methyl-Transferase (COMT) is associated with the alteration of neural processes of appetitive conditioning due to the central role of the dopaminergic system in reward processing. However, no study has so far investigated the relationship between variations in the COMT Val(158) Met-polymorphism and appetitive conditioning. In this fMRI study, an appetitive conditioning paradigm was applied, in which one neutral stimulus (CS+) predicted appetitive stimuli (UCS) while a second neutral stimulus (CS-) was never paired with the UCS. As a main result, we observed a significant association between the COMT Val(158) Met-genotype and appetitive conditioning: skin conductance responses (SCRs) revealed a significant difference between CS+ and CS- in Val/Val-allele carriers but not in the other genotype groups. Val/Val-allele carriers showed increased hemodynamic responses in the amygdala compared with the Met/Met-allele group in the contrast CS+ > CS-. In addition, psychophysiological-interaction analysis revealed increased effective amygdala/ventromedial prefrontal cortex connectivity in Met/Met-allele carriers. The increased amygdala activity points to facilitated appetitive conditioning in Val/Val-allele carriers while the amygdala/prefrontal connectivity results could be regarded as a marker for altered emotion regulation during conditioning, which potentially impacts appetitive learning sensitivity. The SCRs finding indicates a stronger conditioned response in the Val/Val-allele group and dovetails with the neural differences between the groups. These findings contribute to the current research on COMT in emotional processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tim Klucken
- Department of Psychotherapy and Systems Neuroscience, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Germany
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210
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Kindt M. A behavioural neuroscience perspective on the aetiology and treatment of anxiety disorders. Behav Res Ther 2014; 62:24-36. [DOI: 10.1016/j.brat.2014.08.012] [Citation(s) in RCA: 74] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/18/2014] [Revised: 08/18/2014] [Accepted: 08/18/2014] [Indexed: 01/06/2023]
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211
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Rapid plasticity in the prefrontal cortex during affective associative learning. PLoS One 2014; 9:e110720. [PMID: 25333631 PMCID: PMC4204938 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0110720] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/07/2014] [Accepted: 09/15/2014] [Indexed: 01/17/2023] Open
Abstract
MultiCS conditioning is an affective associative learning paradigm, in which affective categories consist of many similar and complex stimuli. Comparing visual processing before and after learning, recent MultiCS conditioning studies using time-sensitive magnetoencephalography (MEG) revealed enhanced activation of prefrontal cortex (PFC) regions towards emotionally paired versus neutral stimuli already during short-latency processing stages (i.e., 50 to 80 ms after stimulus onset). The present study aimed at showing that this rapid differential activation develops as a function of the acquisition and not the extinction of the emotional meaning associated with affectively paired stimuli. MEG data of a MultiCS conditioning study were analyzed with respect to rapid changes in PFC activation towards aversively (electric shock) paired and unpaired faces that occurred during the learning of stimulus-reinforcer contingencies. Analyses revealed an increased PFC activation towards paired stimuli during 50 to 80 ms already during the acquisition of contingencies, which emerged after a single pairing with the electric shock. Corresponding changes in stimulus valence could be observed in ratings of hedonic valence, although participants did not seem to be aware of contingencies. These results suggest rapid formation and access of emotional stimulus meaning in the PFC as well as a great capacity for adaptive and highly resolving learning in the brain under challenging circumstances.
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212
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Zhang S, Wu W, Huang G, Liu Z, Guo S, Yang J, Wang K. Resting-state connectivity in the default mode network and insula during experimental low back pain. Neural Regen Res 2014; 9:135-42. [PMID: 25206794 PMCID: PMC4146160 DOI: 10.4103/1673-5374.125341] [Citation(s) in RCA: 30] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 10/27/2013] [Indexed: 01/02/2023] Open
Abstract
Functional magnetic resonance imaging studies have shown that the insular cortex has a significant role in pain identification and information integration, while the default mode network is associated with cognitive and memory-related aspects of pain perception. However, changes in the functional connectivity between the default mode network and insula during pain remain unclear. This study used 3.0 T functional magnetic resonance imaging scans in 12 healthy subjects aged 24.8 ± 3.3 years to compare the differences in the functional activity and connectivity of the insula and default mode network between the baseline and pain condition induced by intramuscular injection of hypertonic saline. Compared with the baseline, the insula was more functionally connected with the medial prefrontal and lateral temporal cortices, whereas there was lower connectivity with the posterior cingulate cortex, precuneus and inferior parietal lobule in the pain condition. In addition, compared with baseline, the anterior cingulate cortex exhibited greater connectivity with the posterior insula, but lower connectivity with the anterior insula, during the pain condition. These data indicate that experimental low back pain led to dysfunction in the connectivity between the insula and default mode network resulting from an impairment of the regions of the brain related to cognition and emotion, suggesting the importance of the interaction between these regions in pain processing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shanshan Zhang
- Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Zhujiang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
| | - Wen Wu
- Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Zhujiang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
| | - Guozhi Huang
- Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Zhujiang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
| | - Ziping Liu
- Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Zhujiang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
| | - Shigui Guo
- Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Zhujiang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
| | - Jianming Yang
- Department of Radiology, Zhujiang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
| | - Kangling Wang
- Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, Zhujiang Hospital, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
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213
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Baas JMP, Klumpers F, Mantione MH, Figee M, Vulink NC, Schuurman PR, Mazaheri A, Denys D. No impact of deep brain stimulation on fear-potentiated startle in obsessive-compulsive disorder. Front Behav Neurosci 2014; 8:305. [PMID: 25249953 PMCID: PMC4158815 DOI: 10.3389/fnbeh.2014.00305] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/25/2014] [Accepted: 08/22/2014] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Deep brain stimulation (DBS) of the ventral internal capsule is effective in treating therapy refractory obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Given the close proximity of the stimulation site to the stria terminalis (BNST), we hypothesized that the striking decrease in anxiety symptoms following DBS could be the result of the modulation of contextual anxiety. However, the effect of DBS in this region on contextual anxiety is as of yet unknown. Thus, the current study investigated the effect of DBS on contextual anxiety in an experimental threat of shock paradigm. Eight patients with DBS treatment for severe OCD were tested in a double-blind crossover design with randomly assigned 2-week periods of active and sham stimulation. DBS resulted in significant decrease of obsessive-compulsive symptoms, anxiety, and depression. However, even though the threat manipulation resulted in a clear context-potentiated startle effect, none of the parameters derived from the startle recordings was modulated by the DBS. This suggests that DBS in the ventral internal capsule is effective in treating anxiety symptoms of OCD without modulating the startle circuitry. We hypothesize that the anxiety symptoms present in OCD are likely distinct from the pathological brain circuits in defensive states of other anxiety disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Johanna M P Baas
- Department of Experimental Psychology, Faculty of Social Sciences, Utrecht University , Utrecht , Netherlands ; Helmholtz Institute , Utrecht , Netherlands
| | - Floris Klumpers
- Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior, Radboud University , Nijmegen , Netherlands
| | - Mariska H Mantione
- Department of Psychiatry, Academic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam , Amsterdam , Netherlands
| | - Martijn Figee
- Department of Psychiatry, Academic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam , Amsterdam , Netherlands
| | - Nienke C Vulink
- Department of Psychiatry, Academic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam , Amsterdam , Netherlands
| | - P Richard Schuurman
- Department of Neurosurgery, Academic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam , Amsterdam , Netherlands
| | - Ali Mazaheri
- Department of Psychiatry, Academic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam , Amsterdam , Netherlands
| | - Damiaan Denys
- Department of Psychiatry, Academic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam , Amsterdam , Netherlands ; Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences , Amsterdam , Netherlands
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214
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Paret C, Kluetsch R, Ruf M, Demirakca T, Kalisch R, Schmahl C, Ende G. Transient and sustained BOLD signal time courses affect the detection of emotion-related brain activation in fMRI. Neuroimage 2014; 103:522-532. [PMID: 25204866 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2014.08.054] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/27/2014] [Revised: 07/31/2014] [Accepted: 08/29/2014] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
A tremendous amount of effort has been dedicated to unravel the functional neuroanatomy of the processing and regulation of emotion, resulting in a well-described picture of limbic, para-limbic and prefrontal regions involved. Studies applying functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) often use the block-wise presentation of stimuli with affective content, and conventionally model brain activation as a function of stimulus or task duration. However, there is increasing evidence that regional brain responses may not always translate to task duration and rather show stimulus onset-related transient time courses. We assume that brain regions showing transient responses cannot be detected in block designs using a conventional fMRI analysis approach. At the same time, the probability of detecting these regions with conventional analyses may be increased when shorter stimulus timing or a more intense stimulation during a block is used. In a within-subject fMRI study, we presented aversive pictures to 20 healthy subjects and investigated the effect of experimental design (i.e. event-related and block design) on the detection of brain activation in limbic and para-limbic regions of interest of emotion processing. In addition to conventional modeling of sustained activation during blocks of stimulus presentation, we included a second response function into the general linear model (GLM), suited to detect transient time courses at block onset. In the conventional analysis, several regions like the amygdala, thalamus and periaqueductal gray were activated irrespective of design. However, we found a positive BOLD response in the anterior insula (AI) in event-related but not in block-design analyses. GLM analyses suggest that this difference may result from a transient response pattern which cannot be captured by the conventional fMRI analysis approach. Our results indicate that regions with a transient response profile like the AI can be missed in block designs if analyses do not account for transient responses. This may bias conclusions from empirical reports and meta-analyses towards an underestimation of these regions and their role in emotion and emotion regulation. The cognitive processes underlying differential time courses are discussed.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christian Paret
- Department of Neuroimaging, Central Institute of Mental Health Mannheim, Medical Faculty Mannheim/Heidelberg University, Germany; Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, Central Institute of Mental Health Mannheim, Medical Faculty Mannheim/Heidelberg University, Germany.
| | - Rosemarie Kluetsch
- Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, Central Institute of Mental Health Mannheim, Medical Faculty Mannheim/Heidelberg University, Germany.
| | - Matthias Ruf
- Department of Neuroimaging, Central Institute of Mental Health Mannheim, Medical Faculty Mannheim/Heidelberg University, Germany.
| | - Traute Demirakca
- Department of Neuroimaging, Central Institute of Mental Health Mannheim, Medical Faculty Mannheim/Heidelberg University, Germany.
| | - Raffael Kalisch
- Neuroimaging Center Mainz (NIC), Focus Program Translational Neuroscience, Johannes Gutenberg University Medical Center, Mainz, Germany.
| | - Christian Schmahl
- Department of Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, Central Institute of Mental Health Mannheim, Medical Faculty Mannheim/Heidelberg University, Germany.
| | - Gabriele Ende
- Department of Neuroimaging, Central Institute of Mental Health Mannheim, Medical Faculty Mannheim/Heidelberg University, Germany.
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Wieser MJ, Miskovic V, Rausch S, Keil A. Different time course of visuocortical signal changes to fear-conditioned faces with direct or averted gaze: A ssVEP study with single-trial analysis. Neuropsychologia 2014; 62:101-10. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2014.07.009] [Citation(s) in RCA: 21] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/11/2013] [Revised: 07/04/2014] [Accepted: 07/10/2014] [Indexed: 01/11/2023]
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Robinson OJ, Krimsky M, Lieberman L, Allen P, Vytal K, Grillon C. Towards a mechanistic understanding of pathological anxiety: the dorsal medial prefrontal-amygdala 'aversive amplification' circuit in unmedicated generalized and social anxiety disorders. Lancet Psychiatry 2014; 1:294-302. [PMID: 25722962 PMCID: PMC4337019 DOI: 10.1016/s2215-0366(14)70305-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 111] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/13/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND We have delineated, across four prior studies, the role of positive dorsal medial prefrontal/anterior cingulate cortex (dmPFC/ACC)-amygdala circuit coupling during aversive processing in healthy individuals under stress. This translational circuit, termed the 'aversive amplification circuit', is thought to drive adaptive, harm-avoidant behavior in threatening environments. Here, in a natural progression of this prior work, we confirm that this circuit also plays a role in the pathological manifestation of anxiety disorders. METHODS Forty-five unmedicated participants (N=22 generalized and social anxiety disorder/N=23 controls) recruited from Washington DC metropolitan area completed a simple emotion identification task during functional magnetic resonance imaging at the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA. FINDINGS As predicted, a diagnosis by valence interaction was seen in whole-brain amygdala connectivity within the dmPFC/ACC clusters identified in our prior study; driven by significantly greater circuit coupling during fearful versus happy face processing in anxious, but not healthy, participants. Critically, and in accordance with contemporary theoretical approaches to psychiatry, circuit coupling correlated positively with self-reported anxious symptoms, providing evidence of a continuous circuit-subjective symptomatology relationship. INTERPRETATION We track the functional role of a single neural circuit from its involvement in adaptive threat-biases under stress, to its chronic engagement in anxiety disorders in the absence of experimentally induced stress. Thus, we uniquely map a mood and anxiety related circuit across its adaptive and maladaptive stages. Clinically, this may provide a step towards a more mechanistic spectrum-based approach to anxiety disorder diagnosis and may ultimately lead to more targeted treatments.
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Affiliation(s)
- Oliver J Robinson
- Section on Neurobiology of Fear and Anxiety, National Institute of Mental Health, NIH, Bethesda, MD, 20892 USA ; Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London, WC1N 3AR, UK
| | - Marissa Krimsky
- Section on Neurobiology of Fear and Anxiety, National Institute of Mental Health, NIH, Bethesda, MD, 20892 USA
| | - Lynne Lieberman
- Section on Neurobiology of Fear and Anxiety, National Institute of Mental Health, NIH, Bethesda, MD, 20892 USA
| | - Phillip Allen
- Section on Neurobiology of Fear and Anxiety, National Institute of Mental Health, NIH, Bethesda, MD, 20892 USA
| | - Katherine Vytal
- Section on Neurobiology of Fear and Anxiety, National Institute of Mental Health, NIH, Bethesda, MD, 20892 USA
| | - Christian Grillon
- Section on Neurobiology of Fear and Anxiety, National Institute of Mental Health, NIH, Bethesda, MD, 20892 USA
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217
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Haaker J, Golkar A, Hermans D, Lonsdorf TB. A review on human reinstatement studies: an overview and methodological challenges. Learn Mem 2014; 21:424-40. [PMID: 25128533 PMCID: PMC4138360 DOI: 10.1101/lm.036053.114] [Citation(s) in RCA: 127] [Impact Index Per Article: 12.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/07/2014] [Accepted: 06/17/2014] [Indexed: 12/19/2022]
Abstract
In human research, studies of return of fear (ROF) phenomena, and reinstatement in particular, began only a decade ago and recently are more widely used, e.g., as outcome measures for fear/extinction memory manipulations (e.g., reconsolidation). As reinstatement research in humans is still in its infancy, providing an overview of its stability and boundary conditions and summarizing methodological challenges is timely to foster fruitful future research. As a translational endeavor, clarifying the circumstances under which (experimental) reinstatement occurs may offer a first step toward understanding relapse as a clinical phenomenon and pave the way for the development of new pharmacological or behavioral ways to prevent ROF. The current state of research does not yet allow pinpointing these circumstances in detail and we hope this review will aid the research field to advance in this direction. As an introduction, we begin with a synopsis of rodent work on reinstatement and theories that have been proposed to explain the findings. The review however mainly focuses on reinstatement in humans. We first describe details and variations of the experimental setup in reinstatement studies in humans and give a general overview of results. We continue with a compilation of possible experimental boundary conditions and end with the role of individual differences and behavioral and/or pharmacological manipulations. Furthermore, we compile important methodological and design details on the published studies in humans and end with open research questions and some important methodological and design recommendations as a guide for future research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jan Haaker
- Institute for Systems Neuroscience, University Hospital Hamburg-Eppendorf, 20246 Hamburg, Germany Karolinska Institute, Department of Clinical Neuroscience, 171 77 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Armita Golkar
- Karolinska Institute, Department of Clinical Neuroscience, 171 77 Stockholm, Sweden
| | - Dirk Hermans
- Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, University of Leuven, 3000 Leuven, Belgium
| | - Tina B Lonsdorf
- Institute for Systems Neuroscience, University Hospital Hamburg-Eppendorf, 20246 Hamburg, Germany
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218
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Vytal KE, Overstreet C, Charney DR, Robinson OJ, Grillon C. Sustained anxiety increases amygdala-dorsomedial prefrontal coupling: a mechanism for maintaining an anxious state in healthy adults. J Psychiatry Neurosci 2014; 39:321-9. [PMID: 24886788 PMCID: PMC4160361 DOI: 10.1503/jpn.130145] [Citation(s) in RCA: 62] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/21/2022] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Neuroimaging research has traditionally explored fear and anxiety in response to discrete threat cues (e.g., during fear conditioning). However, anxiety is a sustained aversive state that can persist in the absence of discrete threats. Little is known about mechanisms that maintain anxiety states over a prolonged period. Here, we used a robust translational paradigm (threat of shock) to induce sustained anxiety. Recent translational work has implicated an amygdala-prefrontal cortex (PFC) circuit in the maintenance of anxiety in rodents. To explore the functional homologues of this circuitry in humans, we used a novel paradigm to examine the impact of sustained anticipatory anxiety on amygdala-PFC intrinsic connectivity. METHODS Task-independent fMRI data were collected in healthy participants during long-duration periods of shock anticipation and safety. We examined intrinsic functional connectivity. RESULTS Our study involved 20 healthy participants. During sustained anxiety, amygdala activity was positively coupled with dorsomedial PFC (DMPFC) activity. High trait anxiety was associated with increased amygdala-DMPFC coupling. In addition, induced anxiety was associated with positive coupling between regions involved in defensive responding, and decreased coupling between regions involved in emotional control and the default mode network. LIMITATIONS Inferences regarding anxious pathology should be made with caution because this study was conducted in healthy participants. CONCLUSION Findings suggest that anticipatory anxiety increases intrinsic amygdala-DMPFC coupling and that the DMPFC may serve as a functional homologue for the rodent prefrontal regions by sustaining anxiety. Future research may use this defensive neural context to identify biomarkers of risk for anxious pathology and target these circuits for therapeutic intervention.
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Affiliation(s)
- Katherine E. Vytal
- Correspondence to: K.E. Vytal, National Institute of Mental Health, 15K North Dr., MSC 2670, Bethesda MD 20892-2670;
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219
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Comte M, Schön D, Coull JT, Reynaud E, Khalfa S, Belzeaux R, Ibrahim EC, Guedj E, Blin O, Weinberger DR, Fakra E. Dissociating Bottom-Up and Top-Down Mechanisms in the Cortico-Limbic System during Emotion Processing. Cereb Cortex 2014; 26:144-55. [DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhu185] [Citation(s) in RCA: 81] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/14/2022] Open
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220
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Gilmartin MR, Balderston NL, Helmstetter FJ. Prefrontal cortical regulation of fear learning. Trends Neurosci 2014; 37:455-64. [PMID: 24929864 PMCID: PMC4119830 DOI: 10.1016/j.tins.2014.05.004] [Citation(s) in RCA: 122] [Impact Index Per Article: 12.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/28/2014] [Revised: 05/07/2014] [Accepted: 05/13/2014] [Indexed: 11/29/2022]
Abstract
The prefrontal cortex regulates the expression of fear based on previously learned information. Recently, this brain area has emerged as being crucial in the initial formation of fear memories, providing new avenues to study the neurobiology underlying aberrant learning in anxiety disorders. Here we review the circumstances under which the prefrontal cortex is recruited in the formation of memory, highlighting relevant work in laboratory animals and human subjects. We propose that the prefrontal cortex facilitates fear memory through the integration of sensory and emotional signals and through the coordination of memory storage in an amygdala-based network.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marieke R Gilmartin
- Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2441 E. Hartford Ave., Milwaukee, WI 53211, USA; Department of Biomedical Sciences, Marquette University, 561 N 15th Street, Milwaukee, WI 53233, USA.
| | - Nicholas L Balderston
- Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2441 E. Hartford Ave., Milwaukee, WI 53211, USA
| | - Fred J Helmstetter
- Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2441 E. Hartford Ave., Milwaukee, WI 53211, USA
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221
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Meier ML, de Matos NMP, Brügger M, Ettlin DA, Lukic N, Cheetham M, Jäncke L, Lutz K. Equal pain-Unequal fear response: enhanced susceptibility of tooth pain to fear conditioning. Front Hum Neurosci 2014; 8:526. [PMID: 25100974 PMCID: PMC4103082 DOI: 10.3389/fnhum.2014.00526] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/24/2014] [Accepted: 06/28/2014] [Indexed: 01/11/2023] Open
Abstract
Experimental fear conditioning in humans is widely used as a model to investigate the neural basis of fear learning and to unravel the pathogenesis of anxiety disorders. It has been observed that fear conditioning depends on stimulus salience and subject vulnerability to fear. It is further known that the prevalence of dental-related fear and phobia is exceedingly high in the population. Dental phobia is unique as no other body part is associated with a specific phobia. Therefore, we hypothesized that painful dental stimuli exhibit an enhanced susceptibility to fear conditioning when comparing to equal perceived stimuli applied to other body sites. Differential susceptibility to pain-related fear was investigated by analyzing responses to an unconditioned stimulus (UCS) applied to the right maxillary canine (UCS-c) vs. the right tibia (UCS-t). For fear conditioning, UCS-c and USC-t consisted of painful electric stimuli, carefully matched at both application sites for equal intensity and quality perception. UCSs were paired to simple geometrical forms which served as conditioned stimuli (CS+). Unpaired CS+ were presented for eliciting and analyzing conditioned fear responses. Outcome parameter were (1) skin conductance changes and (2) time-dependent brain activity (BOLD responses) in fear-related brain regions such as the amygdala, anterior cingulate cortex, insula, thalamus, orbitofrontal cortex, and medial prefrontal cortex. A preferential susceptibility of dental pain to fear conditioning was observed, reflected by heightened skin conductance responses and enhanced time-dependent brain activity (BOLD responses) in the fear network. For the first time, this study demonstrates fear-related neurobiological mechanisms that point toward a superior conditionability of tooth pain. Beside traumatic dental experiences our results offer novel evidence that might explain the high prevalence of dental-related fears in the population.
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Affiliation(s)
- Michael L. Meier
- Center of Dental Medicine, Clinic for Removable Prosthodontics, Masticatory Disorders and Special Care Dentistry, University of ZurichZurich, Switzerland
- Chiropractic Medicine, Balgrist University HospitalZurich, Switzerland
| | - Nuno M. P. de Matos
- Center of Dental Medicine, Clinic for Removable Prosthodontics, Masticatory Disorders and Special Care Dentistry, University of ZurichZurich, Switzerland
| | - Mike Brügger
- Center of Dental Medicine, Clinic for Removable Prosthodontics, Masticatory Disorders and Special Care Dentistry, University of ZurichZurich, Switzerland
- MRI Technology, Institute for Biomedical Engineering, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology and the University of ZurichZurich, Switzerland
| | - Dominik A. Ettlin
- Center of Dental Medicine, Clinic for Removable Prosthodontics, Masticatory Disorders and Special Care Dentistry, University of ZurichZurich, Switzerland
| | - Nenad Lukic
- Center of Dental Medicine, Clinic for Removable Prosthodontics, Masticatory Disorders and Special Care Dentistry, University of ZurichZurich, Switzerland
| | - Marcus Cheetham
- Institute of Psychology, Department of Neuropsychology, University of ZurichZurich, Switzerland
| | - Lutz Jäncke
- Institute of Psychology, Department of Neuropsychology, University of ZurichZurich, Switzerland
| | - Kai Lutz
- Institute of Psychology, Department of Neuropsychology, University of ZurichZurich, Switzerland
- Center for Neurology and Rehabilitation CereneoVitznau, Switzerland
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222
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Bublatzky F, Gerdes ABM, Alpers GW. The persistence of socially instructed threat: Two threat-of-shock studies. Psychophysiology 2014; 51:1005-14. [DOI: 10.1111/psyp.12251] [Citation(s) in RCA: 33] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/20/2013] [Accepted: 05/07/2014] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Florian Bublatzky
- School of Social Sciences, Department of Psychology, Chair of Clinical and Biological Psychology and Psychotherapy, and Otto Selz Institute; University of Mannheim; Germany
| | - Antje B. M. Gerdes
- School of Social Sciences, Department of Psychology, Chair of Clinical and Biological Psychology and Psychotherapy, and Otto Selz Institute; University of Mannheim; Germany
| | - Georg W. Alpers
- School of Social Sciences, Department of Psychology, Chair of Clinical and Biological Psychology and Psychotherapy, and Otto Selz Institute; University of Mannheim; Germany
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223
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Abstract
AbstractIn The Cognitive-Emotional Brain (Pessoa 2013), I describe the many ways that emotion and cognition interact and are integrated in the brain. The book summarizes five areas of research that support this integrative view and makes four arguments to organize each area. (1) Based on rodent and human data, I propose that the amygdala's functions go beyond emotion as traditionally conceived. Furthermore, the processing of emotion-laden information is capacity limited, thus not independent of attention and awareness. (2) Cognitive-emotional interactions in the human prefrontal cortex (PFC) assume diverse forms and are not limited to mutual suppression. Particularly, the lateral PFC is a focal point for cognitive-emotional interactions. (3) Interactions between motivation and cognition can be seen across a range of perceptual and cognitive tasks. Motivation shapes behavior in specific ways – for example, by reducing response conflict or via selective effects on working memory. Traditional accounts, by contrast, typically describe motivation as a global activation independent of particular control demands. (4) Perception and cognition are directly influenced by information with affective or motivational content in powerful ways. A dual competition model outlines a framework for such interactions at the perceptual and executive levels. A specific neural architecture is proposed that embeds emotional and motivational signals into perception and cognition through multiple channels. (5) A network perspective should supplant the strategy of understanding the brain in terms of individual regions. More broadly, in a network view of brain architecture, “emotion” and “cognition” may be used as labels of certain behaviors, but will not map cleanly into compartmentalized pieces of the brain.
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224
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Dissociable roles for hippocampal and amygdalar volume in human fear conditioning. Brain Struct Funct 2014; 220:2575-86. [PMID: 24903827 DOI: 10.1007/s00429-014-0807-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/18/2013] [Accepted: 05/20/2014] [Indexed: 10/25/2022]
Abstract
Fear conditioning is a basic learning process which involves the association of a formerly neutral conditioned stimulus (CS) with a biologically relevant aversive unconditioned stimulus (US). Previous studies conducted in brain-lesioned patients have shown that while the acquisition of autonomic fear responses requires an intact amygdala, a spared hippocampus is necessary for the development of the CS-US contingency awareness. Although these data have been supported by studies using functional neuroimaging techniques in healthy people, attempts to extend these findings to the morphological aspects of amygdala and hippocampus are missing. Here we tested the hypothesis that amygdalar and hippocampal volumes play dissociable roles in determining autonomic responses and contingency awareness during fear conditioning. Fifty-two healthy individuals (mean age 21.83) underwent high-resolution magnetic resonance imaging. We used a differential delay fear conditioning paradigm while assessing skin conductance responses (SCRs), subjective ratings of CS-US contingency, as well as emotional valence and perceived arousal. Left amygdalar volume significantly predicted the magnitude of differential SCRs during fear acquisition, but had no impact on contingency learning. Conversely, bilateral hippocampal volumes were significantly related to contingency ratings, but not to SCRs. Moreover, left amygdalar volume predicted SCRs to the reinforced CS alone, but not those elicited by the US. Our findings bridge the gap between previous lesion and functional imaging studies, by showing that amygdalar and hippocampal volumes differentially modulate the acquisition of conditioned fear. Further, our results reveal that the morphology of these limbic structures moderate learning and memory already in healthy persons.
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225
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Lonsdorf TB, Haaker J, Fadai T, Kalisch R. No evidence for enhanced extinction memory consolidation through noradrenergic reuptake inhibition-delayed memory test and reinstatement in human fMRI. Psychopharmacology (Berl) 2014; 231:1949-62. [PMID: 24193372 DOI: 10.1007/s00213-013-3338-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 18] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/27/2013] [Accepted: 10/14/2013] [Indexed: 01/12/2023]
Abstract
RATIONALE One promising approach in the current ambition to maximise treatment benefit for anxiety disorders is the pharmacological enhancement of cognitive-behavioural treatment efficacy, which can be experimentally modelled by pharmacological enhancement of extinction learning/consolidation. Noradrenaline (NA) is involved in memory consolidation, and NAergic innervations are found in brain areas implicated in fear conditioning and extinction. OBJECTIVES Thus, to enhance extinction memory consolidation through boosted NAergic signalling, we administered 4 mg reboxetine (RBX) immediately after extinction learning (day 2, 24 h after conditioning on day 1) in a randomised, placebo (PLC)-controlled design. At a delayed memory test (day 8), we probed cued and contextual fear and extinction memories before and after a reinstatement manipulation. RESULTS After reinstatement, we find significantly enhanced amygdala and posterior hippocampus activation in the RBX group, areas implicated in fear memory expression, while the PLC group exhibited enhanced activation in areas associated with extinction memory expression (vmPFC, anterior hippocampus). No group differences were found in skin conductance responses. CONCLUSIONS Thus, our data do not support our hypothesis that enhancement of NA signalling may facilitate extinction memory consolidation and provide preliminary evidence that this might rather enhance fear memories on a neural but not physiological (skin conductance responses) level.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tina B Lonsdorf
- Institute for Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE), Martinistrasse 52, 20246, Hamburg, Germany,
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226
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Kalisch R, Gerlicher AM. Making a mountain out of a molehill: On the role of the rostral dorsal anterior cingulate and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex in conscious threat appraisal, catastrophizing, and worrying. Neurosci Biobehav Rev 2014; 42:1-8. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2014.02.002] [Citation(s) in RCA: 68] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/16/2013] [Revised: 12/20/2013] [Accepted: 02/03/2014] [Indexed: 12/22/2022]
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227
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Denny BT, Ochsner KN, Weber J, Wager TD. Anticipatory brain activity predicts the success or failure of subsequent emotion regulation. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci 2014; 9:403-11. [PMID: 23202664 PMCID: PMC3989121 DOI: 10.1093/scan/nss148] [Citation(s) in RCA: 46] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/28/2012] [Accepted: 11/27/2012] [Indexed: 11/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Expectations about an upcoming emotional event have the power to shape one's subsequent affective response for better or worse. Here, we used mediation analyses to examine the relationship between brain activity when anticipating the need to cognitively reappraise aversive images, amygdala responses to those images and subsequent success in diminishing negative affect. We found that anticipatory activity in right rostrolateral prefrontal cortex was associated with greater subsequent left amygdala responses to aversive images and decreased regulation success. In contrast, anticipatory ventral anterior insula activity was associated with reduced amygdala responses and greater reappraisal success. In both cases, left amygdala responses mediated the relationship between anticipatory activity and reappraisal success. These results suggest that anticipation facilitates successful reappraisal via reduced anticipatory prefrontal 'cognitive' elaboration and better integration of affective information in paralimbic and subcortical systems.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bryan T Denny
- Department of Psychology, Columbia University, 324 Schermerhorn Hall, New York, NY 10027, USA.
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228
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Bulganin L, Bach DR, Wittmann BC. Prior fear conditioning and reward learning interact in fear and reward networks. Front Behav Neurosci 2014; 8:67. [PMID: 24624068 PMCID: PMC3940965 DOI: 10.3389/fnbeh.2014.00067] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/01/2013] [Accepted: 02/17/2014] [Indexed: 01/22/2023] Open
Abstract
The ability to flexibly adapt responses to changes in the environment is important for survival. Previous research in humans separately examined the mechanisms underlying acquisition and extinction of aversive and appetitive conditioned responses. It is yet unclear how aversive and appetitive learning interact on a neural level during counterconditioning in humans. This functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study investigated the interaction of fear conditioning and subsequent reward learning. In the first phase (fear acquisition), images predicted aversive electric shocks or no aversive outcome. In the second phase (counterconditioning), half of the CS+ and CS− were associated with monetary reward in the absence of electric stimulation. The third phase initiated reinstatement of fear through presentation of electric shocks, followed by CS presentation in the absence of shock or reward. Results indicate that participants were impaired at learning the reward contingencies for stimuli previously associated with shock. In the counterconditioning phase, prior fear association interacted with reward representation in the amygdala, where activation was decreased for rewarded compared to unrewarded CS− trials, while there was no reward-related difference in CS+ trials. In the reinstatement phase, an interaction of previous fear association and previous reward status was observed in a reward network consisting of substantia nigra/ventral tegmental area (SN/VTA), striatum and orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), where activation was increased by previous reward association only for CS− but not for CS+ trials. These findings suggest that during counterconditioning, prior fear conditioning interferes with reward learning, subsequently leading to lower activation of the reward network.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lisa Bulganin
- Department of Psychology and Sports Science, University of Giessen Giessen, Germany
| | - Dominik R Bach
- Psychiatric Hospital, University of Zurich Zurich, Switzerland ; Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, University College London London, UK
| | - Bianca C Wittmann
- Department of Psychology and Sports Science, University of Giessen Giessen, Germany
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229
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Shvil E, Sullivan GM, Schafer S, Markowitz JC, Campeas M, Wager TD, Milad MR, Neria Y. Sex differences in extinction recall in posttraumatic stress disorder: a pilot fMRI study. Neurobiol Learn Mem 2014; 113:101-8. [PMID: 24560771 DOI: 10.1016/j.nlm.2014.02.003] [Citation(s) in RCA: 84] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/07/2013] [Revised: 02/10/2014] [Accepted: 02/11/2014] [Indexed: 12/13/2022]
Abstract
Recent research has found that individuals with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) exhibit an impaired memory of fear extinction compounded by deficient functional activation of key nodes of the fear network including the amygdala, hippocampus, ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) and dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC). Research has shown these regions are sexually dimorphic and activate differentially in healthy men and women during fear learning tasks. To explore biological markers of sex differences following exposure to psychological trauma, we used a fear learning and extinction paradigm together with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and skin conductance response (SCR) to assess 31 individuals with PTSD (18 women; 13 men) and 25 matched trauma-exposed healthy control subjects (13 women; 12 men). Whereas no sex differences appeared within the trauma-exposed healthy control group, both psychophysiological and neural activation patterns within the PTSD group indicated deficient recall of extinction memory among men and not among women. Men with PTSD exhibited increased activation in the left rostral dACC during extinction recall compared with women with PTSD. These findings highlight the importance of tracking sex differences in fear extinction when characterizing the underlying neurobiological mechanisms of PTSD psychopathology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Erel Shvil
- Columbia University, Department of Psychiatry, College of Physicians and Surgeons, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA; New York State Psychiatric Institute, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA.
| | - Gregory M Sullivan
- Columbia University, Department of Psychiatry, College of Physicians and Surgeons, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA; New York State Psychiatric Institute, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA
| | - Scott Schafer
- University of Colorado, Boulder Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, CO 80309-0345, USA
| | - John C Markowitz
- Columbia University, Department of Psychiatry, College of Physicians and Surgeons, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA; New York State Psychiatric Institute, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA
| | - Miriam Campeas
- New York State Psychiatric Institute, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA
| | - Tor D Wager
- University of Colorado, Boulder Department of Psychology and Neuroscience, CO 80309-0345, USA
| | - Mohammed R Milad
- Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts General Hospital, Department of Psychiatry, 149, 13th Street, Charlestown, MA 02129, USA
| | - Yuval Neria
- Columbia University, Department of Psychiatry, College of Physicians and Surgeons, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA; New York State Psychiatric Institute, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA; Columbia University, Department of Epidemiology & College of Physicians and Surgeons, 1051 Riverside Drive, New York, NY 10032, USA
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230
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Lonsdorf TB, Haaker J, Kalisch R. Long-term expression of human contextual fear and extinction memories involves amygdala, hippocampus and ventromedial prefrontal cortex: a reinstatement study in two independent samples. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci 2014; 9:1973-83. [PMID: 24493848 DOI: 10.1093/scan/nsu018] [Citation(s) in RCA: 64] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Human context conditioning studies have focused on acquisition and extinction. Subsequent long-term changes in fear behaviors not only depend on associative learning processes during those phases but also on memory consolidation processes and the later ability to retrieve and express fear and extinction memories. Clinical theories explain relapse after successful exposure-based treatment with return of fear memories and remission with stable extinction memory expression. We probed contextual fear and extinction memories 1 week (Day8) after conditioning (Day1) and subsequent extinction (Day2) by presenting conditioned contexts before (Test1) and after (Test2) a reinstatement manipulation. We find consistent activation patterns in two independent samples: activation of a subgenual part of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex before reinstatement (Test1) and (albeit with different temporal profiles between samples) of the amygdala after reinstatement (Test2) as well as up-regulation of anterior hippocampus activity after reinstatement (Test2 > Test1). These areas have earlier been implicated in the expression of cued extinction and fear memories. The present results suggest a general role for these structures in defining the balance between fear and extinction memories, independent of the conditioning mode. The results are discussed in the light of hypotheses implicating the anterior hippocampus in the processing of situational ambiguity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tina B Lonsdorf
- Institute for Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE), Martinistrasse 52, 20246 Hamburg, Germany and Neuroimaging Center Mainz (NIC), Focus Program Translational Neuroscience (FTN), Johannes Gutenberg University Medical Center, Langenbeckstr. 1, 55131 Mainz, Germany t.lonsdorf@uke
| | - Jan Haaker
- Institute for Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE), Martinistrasse 52, 20246 Hamburg, Germany and Neuroimaging Center Mainz (NIC), Focus Program Translational Neuroscience (FTN), Johannes Gutenberg University Medical Center, Langenbeckstr. 1, 55131 Mainz, Germany
| | - Raffael Kalisch
- Institute for Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE), Martinistrasse 52, 20246 Hamburg, Germany and Neuroimaging Center Mainz (NIC), Focus Program Translational Neuroscience (FTN), Johannes Gutenberg University Medical Center, Langenbeckstr. 1, 55131 Mainz, Germany Institute for Systems Neuroscience, University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE), Martinistrasse 52, 20246 Hamburg, Germany and Neuroimaging Center Mainz (NIC), Focus Program Translational Neuroscience (FTN), Johannes Gutenberg University Medical Center, Langenbeckstr. 1, 55131 Mainz, Germany
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231
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Waugh CE, Lemus MG, Gotlib IH. The role of the medial frontal cortex in the maintenance of emotional states. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci 2014; 9:2001-9. [PMID: 24493835 PMCID: PMC4249480 DOI: 10.1093/scan/nsu011] [Citation(s) in RCA: 54] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Evidence is accruing that people can maintain their emotional states, but how they do it and which brain regions are responsible still remains unclear. We examined whether people maintain emotional states 'actively', with explicit elaboration of the emotion, or 'passively', without elaboration. Twenty-four participants completed an emotion maintenance task in which they either maintained the emotional intensity from the first picture of a pair to compare to that of the second picture ('maintain' condition), or only rated their emotional response to the second picture ('non-maintain' condition). Supporting the 'active' maintenance hypothesis, when maintaining vs not maintaining emotion, participants exhibited increased height and width of activation in the dorsal medial frontal cortex (MFC) and lateral prefrontal cortex, regions associated with explicit emotion generation and manipulation of contents in working memory, respectively. Supporting the 'passive' maintenance hypothesis, however, when viewing negative emotional pictures (vs neutral pictures) that were not explicitly maintained, participants exhibited greater duration of activity in the rostral MFC, a region associated with implicit emotion generation. Supported by behavioral findings, this evidence that people maintain emotional states both naturally in the rMFC and strategically in the dMFC may be critical for understanding normal as well as disordered emotion regulation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christian E Waugh
- Wake Forest University, P.O. Box 7778, Winston-Salem, NC 27109, USA and Stanford University, 450 Serra Mall, Stanford, CA 94305
| | - Maria G Lemus
- Wake Forest University, P.O. Box 7778, Winston-Salem, NC 27109, USA and Stanford University, 450 Serra Mall, Stanford, CA 94305
| | - Ian H Gotlib
- Wake Forest University, P.O. Box 7778, Winston-Salem, NC 27109, USA and Stanford University, 450 Serra Mall, Stanford, CA 94305
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232
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Labudda K, Mertens M, Steinkroeger C, Bien CG, Woermann FG. Lesion side matters - an fMRI study on the association between neural correlates of watching dynamic fearful faces and their evaluation in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy. Epilepsy Behav 2014; 31:321-8. [PMID: 24210457 DOI: 10.1016/j.yebeh.2013.10.014] [Citation(s) in RCA: 23] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/17/2013] [Revised: 10/08/2013] [Accepted: 10/10/2013] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
Abstract
Most studies assessing facial affect recognition in patients with TLE reported emotional disturbances in patients with TLE. Results from the few fMRI studies assessing neural correlates of affective face processing in patients with TLE are divergent. Some, but not all, found asymmetrical mesiotemporal activations, i.e., stronger activations within the hemisphere contralateral to seizure onset. Little is known about the association between neural correlates of affect processing and subjective evaluation of the stimuli presented. Therefore, we investigated the neural correlates of processing dynamic fearful faces in 37 patients with mesial temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE; 18 with left-sided TLE (lTLE), 19 with right-sided TLE (rTLE)) and 20 healthy subjects. We additionally assessed individual ratings of the fear intensity and arousal perception of the fMRI stimuli and correlated these data with the activations induced by the fearful face paradigm and activation lateralization within the mesiotemporal structures (in terms of individual lateralization indices, LIs). In healthy subjects, whole-brain analysis showed bilateral activations within a widespread network of mesial and lateral temporal, occipital, and frontal areas. The patient groups activated different parts of this network. In patients with lTLE, we found predominantly right-sided activations within the mesial and lateral temporal cortices and the superior frontal gyrus. In patients with rTLE, we observed bilateral activations in the posterior regions of the lateral temporal lobe and within the occipital cortex. Mesiotemporal region-of-interest analysis showed bilateral symmetric activations associated with watching fearful faces in healthy subjects. According to the region of interest and LI analyses, in the patients with lTLE, mesiotemporal activations were lateralized to the right hemisphere. In the patients with rTLE, we found left-sided mesiotemporal activations. In patients with lTLE, fear ratings were comparable to those of healthy subjects and were correlated with relatively stronger activations in the right compared to the left amygdala. Patients with rTLE showed significantly reduced fear ratings compared to healthy subjects, and we did not find associations with amygdala lateralization. Although we found stronger activations within the contralateral mesial temporal lobe in the majority of all patients, our results suggest that only in the event of left-sided mesiotemporal damage is the right mesial temporal lobe able to preserve intact facial fear recognition. In the event of right-sided mesiotemporal damage, fear recognition is disturbed. This underlines the hypothesis that the right amygdala is biologically predisposed to processing fear, and its function cannot be fully compensated in the event of right-sided mesiotemporal damage.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kirsten Labudda
- Mara Hospital, Bethel Epilepsy Center, Maraweg 21, 33617 Bielefeld, Germany
| | - Markus Mertens
- Mara Hospital, Bethel Epilepsy Center, Maraweg 21, 33617 Bielefeld, Germany
| | | | - Christian G Bien
- Mara Hospital, Bethel Epilepsy Center, Maraweg 21, 33617 Bielefeld, Germany
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233
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Shu IW, Onton JA, Prabhakar N, O'Connell RM, Simmons AN, Matthews SC. Combat veterans with PTSD after mild TBI exhibit greater ERPs from posterior-medial cortical areas while appraising facial features. J Affect Disord 2014; 155:234-40. [PMID: 24342149 DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2013.06.057] [Citation(s) in RCA: 22] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/24/2013] [Accepted: 06/14/2013] [Indexed: 10/26/2022]
Abstract
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) worsens prognosis following mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI). Combat personnel with histories of mTBI exhibit abnormal activation of distributed brain networks-including emotion processing and default mode networks. How developing PTSD further affects these abnormalities has not been directly examined. We recorded electroencephalography in combat veterans with histories of mTBI, but without active PTSD (mTBI only, n=16) and combat veterans who developed PTSD after mTBI (mTBI+PTSD, n=16)-during the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET), a validated test of empathy requiring emotional appraisal of facial features. Task-related event related potentials (ERPs) were identified, decomposed using independent component analysis (ICA) and localized anatomically using dipole modeling. We observed larger emotional face processing ERPs in veterans with mTBI+PTSD, including greater N300 negativity. Furthermore, greater N300 negativity correlated with greater PTSD severity, especially avoidance/numbing and hyperarousal symptom clusters. This correlation was dependent on contributions from the precuneus and posterior cingulate cortex (PCC). Our results support a model where, in combat veterans with histories of mTBI, larger ERPs from over-active posterior-medial cortical areas may be specific to PTSD, and is likely related to negative self-referential activity.
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Affiliation(s)
- I-Wei Shu
- VISN-22 Mental Illness, Research, Education and Clinical Center, 3350 La Jolla Village Drive, #116A, San Diego, CA 92161, USA; Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System, 3350 La Jolla Village Drive, #116A, San Diego, CA 92161, USA.
| | - Julie A Onton
- Naval Health Research Center, 140 Sylvester Rd, Department 162, San Diego, CA 92106, USA
| | - Nitin Prabhakar
- Department of Psychiatry, University of California San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive #9116A, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA
| | - Ryan M O'Connell
- Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System, 3350 La Jolla Village Drive, #116A, San Diego, CA 92161, USA; Department of Psychiatry, University of California San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive #9116A, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA
| | - Alan N Simmons
- Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System, 3350 La Jolla Village Drive, #116A, San Diego, CA 92161, USA; Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System Center of Excellence for Stress and Mental Health, 3350 La Jolla Village Drive, #116A, San Diego, CA 92161, USA
| | - Scott C Matthews
- VISN-22 Mental Illness, Research, Education and Clinical Center, 3350 La Jolla Village Drive, #116A, San Diego, CA 92161, USA; Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System Center of Excellence for Stress and Mental Health, 3350 La Jolla Village Drive, #116A, San Diego, CA 92161, USA
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234
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Functional overlap of top-down emotion regulation and generation: An fMRI study identifying common neural substrates between cognitive reappraisal and cognitively generated emotions. COGNITIVE AFFECTIVE & BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE 2014; 14:923-38. [DOI: 10.3758/s13415-013-0240-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 41] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/23/2022]
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235
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Pleger B, Draganski B, Schwenkreis P, Lenz M, Nicolas V, Maier C, Tegenthoff M. Complex regional pain syndrome type I affects brain structure in prefrontal and motor cortex. PLoS One 2014; 9:e85372. [PMID: 24416397 PMCID: PMC3887056 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0085372] [Citation(s) in RCA: 43] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/11/2013] [Accepted: 11/25/2013] [Indexed: 11/19/2022] Open
Abstract
The complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) is a rare but debilitating pain disorder that mostly occurs after injuries to the upper limb. A number of studies indicated altered brain function in CRPS, whereas possible influences on brain structure remain poorly investigated. We acquired structural magnetic resonance imaging data from CRPS type I patients and applied voxel-by-voxel statistics to compare white and gray matter brain segments of CRPS patients with matched controls. Patients and controls were statistically compared in two different ways: First, we applied a 2-sample ttest to compare whole brain white and gray matter structure between patients and controls. Second, we aimed to assess structural alterations specifically of the primary somatosensory (S1) and motor cortex (M1) contralateral to the CRPS affected side. To this end, MRI scans of patients with left-sided CRPS (and matched controls) were horizontally flipped before preprocessing and region-of-interest-based group comparison. The unpaired ttest of the "non-flipped" data revealed that CRPS patients presented increased gray matter density in the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex. The same test applied to the "flipped" data showed further increases in gray matter density, not in the S1, but in the M1 contralateral to the CRPS-affected limb which were inversely related to decreased white matter density of the internal capsule within the ipsilateral brain hemisphere. The gray-white matter interaction between motor cortex and internal capsule suggests compensatory mechanisms within the central motor system possibly due to motor dysfunction. Altered gray matter structure in dorsomedial prefrontal cortex may occur in response to emotional processes such as pain-related suffering or elevated analgesic top-down control.
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Affiliation(s)
- Burkhard Pleger
- Department of Neurology, Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig, Germany
- Clinic for Cognitive Neurology, University Hospital Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany
- * E-mail:
| | - Bogdan Draganski
- Laboratoire de Recherche en Neuroimagerie – LREN, Departement des neurosciences cliniques, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois (CHUV), Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Peter Schwenkreis
- Department of Neurology, University Hospital Bergmannsheil, Bochum, Germany
| | - Melanie Lenz
- Department of Neurology, University Hospital Bergmannsheil, Bochum, Germany
| | - Volkmar Nicolas
- Department of Radiology, University Hospital Bergmannsheil, Bochum, Germany
| | - Christoph Maier
- Department of Pain Treatment, University Hospital Bergmannsheil, Bochum, Germany
| | - Martin Tegenthoff
- Department of Neurology, University Hospital Bergmannsheil, Bochum, Germany
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236
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Maier SJ, Szalkowski A, Kamphausen S, Feige B, Perlov E, Kalisch R, Jacob GA, Philipsen A, Tüscher O, Tebartz van Elst L. Altered cingulate and amygdala response towards threat and safe cues in attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Psychol Med 2014; 44:85-98. [PMID: 23510549 DOI: 10.1017/s0033291713000469] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/30/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Emotional dysregulation is becoming increasingly recognized as an important feature of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). In this study, two experiments were conducted investigating the neural response to either verbally instructed fear (IF) or uninstructed (classically conditioned) fear (UF) using the skin conductance response (SCR) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). METHOD In the conditioning phase of the UF experiment (17 ADHD and 17 healthy controls), subjects experienced an unconditioned stimulus (UCS, unpleasant electrodermal stimulation) paired with a former neutral conditioned stimulus (CS+), whereas a control stimulus (CS-) was never paired with the UCS. In the subsequent test phase, only the CS+ and the CS- were presented. In the IF experiment (13 ADHD and 17 healthy controls), subjects were only told that an independently experienced UCS might occur together with the CS+ but not the CS- during testing. No UCS was presented. RESULTS Groups did not detectably differ in SCR or neural responses to UF. In IF, ADHD patients showed a trend-line decreased SCR and significantly decreased activation of the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), a region prominently involved in fear responding, to the CS+. This was accompanied by higher amygdala activation to the CS-. CONCLUSIONS During IF, ADHD patients showed deficits in regions centrally involved in fear learning and expression in terms of diminished CS+-related dACC and increased CS--related amygdala signals. This suggests an impaired processing of verbally transmitted aversive information, which is central for conveying fear information in social contexts. This result extends the growing literature on emotional alterations in ADHD.
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Affiliation(s)
- S J Maier
- Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Medical Centre Freiburg, Germany
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237
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Alexopoulos GS, Arean P. A model for streamlining psychotherapy in the RDoC era: the example of 'Engage'. Mol Psychiatry 2014; 19:14-9. [PMID: 24280983 PMCID: PMC4337206 DOI: 10.1038/mp.2013.150] [Citation(s) in RCA: 72] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/18/2013] [Revised: 08/30/2013] [Accepted: 09/24/2013] [Indexed: 12/19/2022]
Abstract
A critical task for psychotherapy research is to create treatments that can be used by community clinicians. Streamlining of psychotherapies is a necessary first step for this purpose. We suggest that neurobiological knowledge has reached the point of providing biologically meaningful behavioral targets, thus guiding the development of effective, simplified psychotherapies. This view is supported by the Research Domain Criteria (RDoC) Project, which reflects the field's consensus and recognizes the readiness of neurobiology to guide research in treatment development. 'Engage' is an example of such a streamlined therapy. It targets behavioral domains of late-life depression grounded on RDoC constructs using efficacious behavioral strategies selected for their simplicity. 'Reward exposure' targeting the behavioral expression of positive valence systems' dysfunction is the principal therapeutic vehicle of 'Engage'. Its first three sessions consist of direct 'reward exposure', but the therapists search for barriers in three behavioral domains, that is, 'negativity bias' (negative valence), 'apathy' (arousal) and 'emotional dysregulation' (cognitive control), and add strategies targeting these domains when needed. The end result is a structured, stepped approach using neurobiological constructs as targets and as a guide to personalization. We argue that the 'reduction' process needed in order to arrive to simplified effective therapies can be achieved in three steps: (1) identify RDoC constructs driving the syndrome's psychopathology; (2) create a structured intervention utilizing behavioral and ecosystem modification techniques targeting behaviors related to these constructs; (3) examine whether the efficacy of the new intervention is mediated by change in behaviors related to the targeted RDoC constructs.
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238
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Weston CSE. Posttraumatic stress disorder: a theoretical model of the hyperarousal subtype. Front Psychiatry 2014; 5:37. [PMID: 24772094 PMCID: PMC3983492 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyt.2014.00037] [Citation(s) in RCA: 69] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/20/2014] [Accepted: 03/20/2014] [Indexed: 12/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a frequent and distressing mental disorder, about which much remains to be learned. It is a heterogeneous disorder; the hyperarousal subtype (about 70% of occurrences and simply termed PTSD in this paper) is the topic of this article, but the dissociative subtype (about 30% of occurrences and likely involving quite different brain mechanisms) is outside its scope. A theoretical model is presented that integrates neuroscience data on diverse brain regions known to be involved in PTSD, and extensive psychiatric findings on the disorder. Specifically, the amygdala is a multifunctional brain region that is crucial to PTSD, and processes peritraumatic hyperarousal on grounded cognition principles to produce hyperarousal symptoms. Amygdala activity also modulates hippocampal function, which is supported by a large body of evidence, and likewise amygdala activity modulates several brainstem regions, visual cortex, rostral anterior cingulate cortex (rACC), and medial orbitofrontal cortex (mOFC), to produce diverse startle, visual, memory, numbing, anger, and recklessness symptoms. Additional brain regions process other aspects of peritraumatic responses to produce further symptoms. These contentions are supported by neuroimaging, neuropsychological, neuroanatomical, physiological, cognitive, and behavioral evidence. Collectively, the model offers an account of how responses at the time of trauma are transformed into an extensive array of the 20 PTSD symptoms that are specified in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth edition. It elucidates the neural mechanisms of a specific form of psychopathology, and accords with the Research Domain Criteria framework.
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239
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Larson CL, Baskin-Sommers AR, Stout DM, Balderston NL, Curtin JJ, Schultz DH, Kiehl KA, Newman JP. The interplay of attention and emotion: top-down attention modulates amygdala activation in psychopathy. COGNITIVE, AFFECTIVE & BEHAVIORAL NEUROSCIENCE 2013; 13:757-70. [PMID: 23712665 PMCID: PMC3806893 DOI: 10.3758/s13415-013-0172-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 63] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/08/2022]
Abstract
Psychopathic behavior has long been attributed to a fundamental deficit in fear that arises from impaired amygdala function. Growing evidence has demonstrated that fear-potentiated startle (FPS) and other psychopathy-related deficits are moderated by focus of attention, but to date, no work on adult psychopathy has examined attentional modulation of the amygdala or concomitant recruitment of relevant attention-related circuitry. Consistent with previous FPS findings, here we report that psychopathy-related differences in amygdala activation appear and disappear as a function of goal-directed attention. Specifically, decreased amygdala activity was observed in psychopathic offenders only when attention was engaged in an alternative goal-relevant task prior to presenting threat-relevant information. Under this condition, psychopaths also exhibited greater activation in selective-attention regions of the lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC) than did nonpsychopaths, and this increased LPFC activation mediated psychopathy's association with decreased amygdala activation. In contrast, when explicitly attending to threat, amygdala activation did not differ in psychopaths and nonpsychopaths. This pattern of amygdala activation highlights the potential role of LPFC in mediating the failure of psychopathic individuals to process fear and other important information when it is peripheral to the primary focus of goal-directed attention.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christine L Larson
- Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, P.O. Box 413, Milwaukee, WI, 53201, USA,
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240
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Ertl M, Hildebrandt M, Ourina K, Leicht G, Mulert C. Emotion regulation by cognitive reappraisal — The role of frontal theta oscillations. Neuroimage 2013; 81:412-421. [DOI: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2013.05.044] [Citation(s) in RCA: 76] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/04/2012] [Revised: 04/16/2013] [Accepted: 05/07/2013] [Indexed: 11/26/2022] Open
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Merz CJ, Wolf OT, Schweckendiek J, Klucken T, Vaitl D, Stark R. Stress differentially affects fear conditioning in men and women. Psychoneuroendocrinology 2013; 38:2529-41. [PMID: 23790683 DOI: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2013.05.015] [Citation(s) in RCA: 78] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/18/2013] [Revised: 04/22/2013] [Accepted: 05/24/2013] [Indexed: 02/08/2023]
Abstract
Stress and fear conditioning processes are both important vulnerability factors in the development of psychiatric disorders. In behavioral studies considerable sex differences in fear learning have been observed after increases of the stress hormone cortisol. But neuroimaging experiments, which give insights into the neurobiological correlates of stress × sex interactions in fear conditioning, are lacking so far. In the current functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study, we tested whether a psychosocial stressor (Trier Social Stress Test) compared to a control condition influenced subsequent fear conditioning in 48 men and 48 women taking oral contraceptives (OCs). One of two pictures of a geometrical figure was always paired (conditioned stimulus, CS+) or never paired (CS-) with an electrical stimulation (unconditioned stimulus). BOLD responses as well as skin conductance responses were assessed. Sex-independently, stress enhanced the CS+/CS- differentiation in the hippocampus in early acquisition but attenuated conditioned responses in the medial frontal cortex in late acquisition. In early acquisition, stress reduced the CS+/CS- differentiation in the nucleus accumbens in men, but enhanced it in OC women. In late acquisition, the same pattern (reduction in men, enhancement in OC women) was found in the amygdala as well as in the anterior cingulate. Thus, psychosocial stress impaired the neuronal correlates of fear learning and expression in men, but facilitated them in OC women. A sex-specific modulation of fear conditioning after stress might contribute to the divergent prevalence of men and women in developing psychiatric disorders.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christian Josef Merz
- Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Department of Cognitive Psychology, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44780 Bochum, Germany; Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10H, 35394 Giessen, Germany.
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Haller S, Cunningham G, Laedermann A, Hofmeister J, Van De Ville D, Lovblad KO, Hoffmeyer P. Shoulder apprehension impacts large-scale functional brain networks. AJNR Am J Neuroradiol 2013; 35:691-7. [PMID: 24091445 DOI: 10.3174/ajnr.a3738] [Citation(s) in RCA: 25] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/07/2022]
Abstract
BACKROUND AND PURPOSE Shoulder apprehension is defined as anxiety and resistance in patients with a history of anterior glenohumeral instability. It remains unclear whether shoulder apprehension is the result of true recurrent instability or a memorized subjective sensation. We tested whether visual presentation of apprehension videos modifies functional brain networks associated with motor resistance and anxiety. MATERIALS AND METHODS This prospective study includes 15 consecutive right-handed male patients with shoulder apprehension (9 with right shoulder apprehension, 6 with left shoulder apprehension; 27.5 ± 6.4 years) and 10 healthy male right-handed age-matched control participants (29.0 ± 4.7 years). Multimodal MR imaging included 1) functional connectivity tensorial independent component analysis, 2) task-related general linear model analysis during visual stimulation of movies showing typical apprehension movements vs control videos, 3) voxel-based morphometry analysis of GM, and 4) tract-based spatial statistics analysis of WM. RESULTS Patients with shoulder apprehension had significant (P < .05 corrected) increase in task-correlated functional connectivity, notably in the bilateral primary sensory-motor area and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and, to a lesser degree, the bilateral dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, anterior insula, and dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (+148% right, +144% left). Anticorrelated functional connectivity decreased in the higher-level visual and parietal areas (-185%). There were no potentially confounding structural changes in GM or WM. CONCLUSIONS Shoulder apprehension induces specific reorganization in apprehension-related functional connectivity of the primary sensory-motor areas (motor resistance), dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (cognitive control of motor behavior), and the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex/dorsomedial prefrontal cortex and anterior insula (anxiety and emotional regulation).
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Affiliation(s)
- S Haller
- From the Departments of Imaging and Medical Informatics (S.H., J.H., K.-O.L.)
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243
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Fear conditioning, persistence of disruptive behavior and psychopathic traits: an fMRI study. Transl Psychiatry 2013; 3:e319. [PMID: 24169638 PMCID: PMC3818535 DOI: 10.1038/tp.2013.89] [Citation(s) in RCA: 39] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/15/2013] [Revised: 08/21/2013] [Accepted: 09/08/2013] [Indexed: 11/29/2022] Open
Abstract
Children diagnosed with Disruptive Behavior Disorders (DBD), especially those with psychopathic traits, are at risk of developing persistent and severe antisocial behavior. Deficient fear conditioning may be a key mechanism underlying persistence, and has been associated with altered regional brain function in adult antisocial populations. In this study, we investigated the associations between the neural correlates of fear conditioning, persistence of childhood-onset DBD during adolescence and psychopathic traits. From a cohort of children arrested before the age of 12 years, participants who were diagnosed with Oppositional Defiant Disorder or Conduct Disorder in previous waves (mean age of onset 6.5 years, s.d. 3.2) were reassessed at mean age 17.6 years (s.d. 1.4) and categorized as persistent (n=25) or desistent (n=25) DBD. Using the Youth Psychopathic Traits Inventory and functional magnetic resonance imaging during a fear conditioning task, these subgroups were compared with 26 matched healthy controls from the same cohort. Both persistent and desistent DBD subgroups were found to show higher activation in fear processing-related brain areas during fear conditioning compared with healthy controls. In addition, regression analyses revealed that impulsive-irresponsible and grandiose-manipulative psychopathic traits were associated with higher activation, whereas callous-unemotional psychopathic traits were related to lower activation in fear-related areas. Finally, the association between neural activation and DBD subgroup membership was mediated by impulsive-irresponsible psychopathic traits. These results provide evidence for heterogeneity in the neurobiological mechanisms underlying psychopathic traits and antisocial behavior and, as such, underscore the need to develop personalized interventions.
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Abstract
During global health crises, such as the recent H1N1 pandemic, the mass media provide the public with timely information regarding risk. To obtain new insights into how these messages are received, we measured neural data while participants, who differed in their preexisting H1N1 risk perceptions, viewed a TV report about H1N1. Intersubject correlation (ISC) of neural time courses was used to assess how similarly the brains of viewers responded to the TV report. We found enhanced intersubject correlations among viewers with high-risk perception in the anterior cingulate, a region which classical fMRI studies associated with the appraisal of threatening information. By contrast, neural coupling in sensory-perceptual regions was similar for the high and low H1N1-risk perception groups. These results demonstrate a novel methodology for understanding how real-life health messages are processed in the human brain, with particular emphasis on the role of emotion and differences in risk perceptions.
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245
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Merz CJ, Hermann A, Stark R, Wolf OT. Cortisol modifies extinction learning of recently acquired fear in men. Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci 2013; 9:1426-34. [PMID: 23945999 DOI: 10.1093/scan/nst137] [Citation(s) in RCA: 45] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/23/2023] Open
Abstract
Exposure therapy builds on the mechanism of fear extinction leading to decreased fear responses. How the stress hormone cortisol affects brain regions involved in fear extinction in humans is unknown. For this reason, we tested 32 men randomly assigned to receive either 30 mg hydrocortisone or placebo 45 min before fear extinction. In fear acquisition, a picture of a geometrical figure was either partially paired (conditioned stimulus; CS+) or not paired (CS-) with an electrical stimulation (unconditioned stimulus; UCS). In fear extinction, each CS was presented again, but no UCS occurred. Cortisol increased conditioned skin conductance responses in early and late extinction. In early extinction, higher activation towards the CS- than to the CS+ was found in the amygdala, hippocampus and posterior parahippocampal gyrus. This pattern might be associated with the establishment of a new memory trace. In late extinction, the placebo compared with the cortisol group displayed enhanced CS+/CS- differentiation in the amygdala, medial frontal cortex and nucleus accumbens. A change from early deactivation to late activation of the extinction circuit as seen in the placebo group seems to be needed to enhance extinction and to reduce fear. Cortisol appears to interfere with this process thereby impairing extinction of recently acquired conditioned fear.
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Affiliation(s)
- Christian Josef Merz
- Department of Cognitive Psychology, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44780 Bochum, Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, and Department of Psychotherapy and Systems Neuroscience, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10F, 35394 Giessen, Germany Department of Cognitive Psychology, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44780 Bochum, Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, and Department of Psychotherapy and Systems Neuroscience, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10F, 35394 Giessen, Germany
| | - Andrea Hermann
- Department of Cognitive Psychology, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44780 Bochum, Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, and Department of Psychotherapy and Systems Neuroscience, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10F, 35394 Giessen, Germany Department of Cognitive Psychology, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44780 Bochum, Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, and Department of Psychotherapy and Systems Neuroscience, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10F, 35394 Giessen, Germany
| | - Rudolf Stark
- Department of Cognitive Psychology, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44780 Bochum, Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, and Department of Psychotherapy and Systems Neuroscience, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10F, 35394 Giessen, Germany Department of Cognitive Psychology, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44780 Bochum, Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, and Department of Psychotherapy and Systems Neuroscience, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10F, 35394 Giessen, Germany
| | - Oliver Tobias Wolf
- Department of Cognitive Psychology, Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44780 Bochum, Bender Institute of Neuroimaging, and Department of Psychotherapy and Systems Neuroscience, Justus Liebig University Giessen, Otto-Behaghel-Str. 10F, 35394 Giessen, Germany
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246
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Bourne C, Mackay CE, Holmes EA. The neural basis of flashback formation: the impact of viewing trauma. Psychol Med 2013; 43:1521-1532. [PMID: 23171530 PMCID: PMC3806039 DOI: 10.1017/s0033291712002358] [Citation(s) in RCA: 95] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/05/2012] [Revised: 08/20/2012] [Accepted: 08/28/2012] [Indexed: 12/01/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Psychological traumatic events, such as war or road traffic accidents, are widespread. A small but significant proportion of survivors develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Distressing, sensory-based involuntary memories of trauma (henceforth 'flashbacks') are the hallmark symptom of PTSD. Understanding the development of flashbacks may aid their prevention. This work is the first to combine the trauma film paradigm (as an experimental analogue for flashback development) with neuroimaging to investigate the neural basis of flashback aetiology. We investigated the hypothesis that involuntary recall of trauma (flashback) is determined during the original event encoding. Method A total of 22 healthy volunteers viewed a traumatic film whilst undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). They kept a 1-week diary to record flashbacks to specific film scenes. Using a novel prospective fMRI design, we compared brain activation for those film scenes that subsequently induced flashbacks with both non-traumatic control scenes and scenes with traumatic content that did not elicit flashbacks ('potentials'). RESULTS Encoding of scenes that later caused flashbacks was associated with widespread increases in activation, including in the amygdala, striatum, rostral anterior cingulate cortex, thalamus and ventral occipital cortex. The left inferior frontal gyrus and bilateral middle temporal gyrus also exhibited increased activation but only relative to 'potentials'. Thus, these latter regions appeared to distinguish between traumatic content that subsequently flashed back and comparable content that did not. CONCLUSIONS Results provide the first prospective evidence that the brain behaves differently whilst experiencing emotional events that will subsequently become involuntary memories - flashbacks. Understanding the neural basis of analogue flashback memory formation may aid the development of treatment interventions for this PTSD feature.
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Affiliation(s)
- C. Bourne
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Warneford Hospital, Oxford, UK
| | - C. E. Mackay
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Warneford Hospital, Oxford, UK
- FMRIB Centre, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
| | - E. A. Holmes
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Warneford Hospital, Oxford, UK
- MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, Cambridge, UK
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247
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Hu K, Padmala S, Pessoa L. Interactions between reward and threat during visual processing. Neuropsychologia 2013; 51:1763-72. [PMID: 23770538 DOI: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2013.05.025] [Citation(s) in RCA: 29] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/04/2013] [Revised: 05/08/2013] [Accepted: 05/23/2013] [Indexed: 10/26/2022]
Abstract
Appetitive stimuli such as monetary incentives often improve performance whereas aversive stimuli such as task-irrelevant negative stimuli frequently impair performance. But our understanding of how appetitive and aversive processes simultaneously contribute to brain and behavior is rudimentary. In the current fMRI study, we investigated interactions between reward and threat by investigating the effects of monetary reward on the processing of task-irrelevant threat stimuli during a visual discrimination task. Reward was manipulated by linking fast and accurate responses to foreground stimuli with monetary reward; threat was manipulated by pairing the background context with mild aversive shock. The behavioral results in terms of both accuracy and reaction time revealed that monetary reward eliminated the influence of threat-related stimuli. Paralleling the behavioral results, during trials involving both reward and threat, the imaging data revealed increased engagement of the ventral caudate and anterior mid-cingulate cortex, which were accompanied by increased task-relevant processing in the visual cortex. Overall, our study illustrates how the simultaneous processing of appetitive and aversive information shapes both behavior and brain responses.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kesong Hu
- Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA
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248
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Sripada RK, Marx CE, King AP, Rampton JC, Ho S, Liberzon I. Allopregnanolone elevations following pregnenolone administration are associated with enhanced activation of emotion regulation neurocircuits. Biol Psychiatry 2013; 73:1045-53. [PMID: 23348009 PMCID: PMC3648625 DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2012.12.008] [Citation(s) in RCA: 76] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/13/2012] [Revised: 11/16/2012] [Accepted: 12/09/2012] [Indexed: 02/08/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND The neurosteroid allopregnanolone is a potent allosteric modulator of the gamma-aminobutyric acid type A receptor with anxiolytic properties. Exogenous administration of allopregnanolone reduces anxiety, and allopregnanolone blockade impairs social and affective functioning. However, the neural mechanism whereby allopregnanolone improves mood and reduces anxiety is unknown. In particular, brain imaging has not been used to link neurosteroid effects to emotion regulation neurocircuitry. METHODS To investigate the brain basis of allopregnanolone's impact on emotion regulation, participants were administered 400 mg of pregnenolone (n=16) or placebo (n=15) and underwent 3T functional magnetic resonance imaging while performing the shifted-attention emotion appraisal task, which probes emotional processing and regulation. RESULTS Compared with placebo, allopregnanolone was associated with reduced activity in the amygdala and insula across all conditions. During the appraisal condition, allopregnanolone increased activity in the dorsal medial prefrontal cortex and enhanced connectivity between the amygdala and dorsal medial prefrontal cortex, an effect that was associated with reduced self-reported anxiety. CONCLUSIONS These results demonstrate that in response to emotional stimuli, allopregnanolone reduces activity in regions associated with generation of negative emotion. Furthermore, allopregnanolone may enhance activity in regions linked to regulatory processes. Aberrant activity in these regions has been linked to anxiety psychopathology. These results thus provide initial neuroimaging evidence that allopregnanolone may be a target for pharmacologic intervention in the treatment of anxiety disorders and suggest potential future directions for research into neurosteroid effects on emotion regulation neurocircuitry.
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Affiliation(s)
- Rebecca K. Sripada
- Psychiatry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI,Psychology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI,Corresponding author: Rebecca K. Sripada, 4250 Plymouth Road, 2702 Rachel Upjohn Building, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, , Tel : (734) 232-0190, Fax : (734) 936-7868
| | - Christine E. Marx
- Psychiatry, Duke University, Durham, NC,Durham VA Medical Center, Durham, NC
| | - Anthony P. King
- Psychiatry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI,Ann Arbor VA Medical Center, Ann Arbor, MI
| | | | - Shaun Ho
- Psychiatry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
| | - Israel Liberzon
- Psychiatry, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI,Psychology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI,Ann Arbor VA Medical Center, Ann Arbor, MI
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249
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Kamphausen S, Schröder P, Maier S, Bader K, Feige B, Kaller CP, Glauche V, Ohlendorf S, Tebartz van Elst L, Klöppel S, Jacob GA, Silbersweig D, Lieb K, Tüscher O. Medial prefrontal dysfunction and prolonged amygdala response during instructed fear processing in borderline personality disorder. World J Biol Psychiatry 2013; 14:307-18, S1-4. [PMID: 22404662 DOI: 10.3109/15622975.2012.665174] [Citation(s) in RCA: 50] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/13/2022]
Abstract
OBJECTIVES Affective dysregulation is a clinical hallmark of borderline personality disorder (BPD). This study used an instructed fear task combined with functional MRI (fMRI) and skin conductance response (SCR) to test hypotheses about mechanisms of disturbed fronto-limbic neural circuitry underlying dysfunctional emotional processing in BPD. METHODS Female BPD patients and matched control subjects were exposed to two visual stimuli during fMRI scanning and SCR recording. Subjects were instructed shortly before scanning that one stimulus (Threat) potentially represents an aversive event whereas another stimulus (Safe) represents safety. The aversive event (electrodermal stimulation) itself was only experienced before this instruction and never occurred during fMRI scanning. RESULTS Both groups showed stronger SCR to Threat compared to Safe indicating differential fear response which habituated over time. BPD compared to control subjects did not show fMRI signal decrease of amygdala activity or relative ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) activity increase over time. Moreover, BPD patients showed increased connectivity of the amygdala with vmPFC but decreased connectivity of subgenual ACC with dorsal ACC compared to control subjects. CONCLUSIONS Prolonged amygdala response and a functional disconnection between ventral and dorsal mPFC regions may be part of the neural mechanisms underlying emotional dysregulation in BPD patients.
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Affiliation(s)
- Susanne Kamphausen
- Departments of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Medical Centre Freiburg, Germany
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250
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Hyperacusis-associated pathological resting-state brain oscillations in the tinnitus brain: a hyperresponsiveness network with paradoxically inactive auditory cortex. Brain Struct Funct 2013; 219:1113-28. [PMID: 23609486 DOI: 10.1007/s00429-013-0555-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 37] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/19/2013] [Accepted: 04/11/2013] [Indexed: 10/26/2022]
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