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Nestor PG, Levin LK, Stone WS, Giuliano AJ, Seidman LJ, Levitt JJ. Brain structural abnormalities of the associative striatum in adolescents and young adults at genetic high-risk of schizophrenia: Implications for illness endophenotypes. J Psychiatr Res 2022; 155:355-362. [PMID: 36179416 DOI: 10.1016/j.jpsychires.2022.08.027] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/23/2022] [Revised: 08/26/2022] [Accepted: 08/31/2022] [Indexed: 11/15/2022]
Abstract
OBJECTIVE Dysfunction in cortico-striatal circuitry represents a core component of the pathophysiology in schizophrenia (SZ) but its potential as a candidate endophenotype of the illness is often confounded by neuroleptic medication. METHODS Accordingly, 26 adolescent and young adult participants at genetic high-risk for schizophrenia, but who were asymptomatic and neuroleptic naïve, and 28 age-matched controls underwent 1.5T structural magnetic resonance imaging of the striatum, manually parcellated into limbic (LST), associative (AST), and sensorimotor (SMST) functional subregions. RESULTS In relation to their age peers, participants at genetic high-risk for schizophrenia showed overall lower striatal gray matter volume with their most pronounced loss, bilaterally in the AST, but not the LST or SMST. Neuropsychological testing revealed reduced executive functioning for genetically at-risk participants, although the groups did not differ significantly in overall intelligence or oral reading. For controls but not for at-genetic high-risk participants, stronger executive functioning correlated with increased bilateral AST volume. CONCLUSIONS Reduced bilateral AST volume in genetic high-risk adolescents and young adults, accompanied by heritable loss of higher cognitive brain-behavior relationships, might serve as a useful endophenotype of SZ.
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Affiliation(s)
- Paul G Nestor
- Department of Psychology, University of Massachusetts, Boston, MA, USA; Clinical Neuroscience Division, Laboratory of Neuroscience, Department of Psychiatry, VA Boston Healthcare System, Brockton Division, Brockton, MA, 02301, USA; Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02115, USA
| | - Laura K Levin
- Psychiatry Neuroimaging Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02215, USA
| | - William S Stone
- Department of Psychiatry, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Massachusetts Mental Health Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02115, USA
| | - Anthony J Giuliano
- Department of Psychiatry, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Massachusetts Mental Health Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02115, USA
| | - Larry J Seidman
- Department of Psychiatry, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Massachusetts Mental Health Center, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02115, USA
| | - James J Levitt
- Clinical Neuroscience Division, Laboratory of Neuroscience, Department of Psychiatry, VA Boston Healthcare System, Brockton Division, Brockton, MA, 02301, USA; Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02115, USA; Psychiatry Neuroimaging Laboratory, Department of Psychiatry, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02215, USA.
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Brain structural correlates of familial risk for mental illness: a meta-analysis of voxel-based morphometry studies in relatives of patients with psychotic or mood disorders. Neuropsychopharmacology 2020; 45:1369-1379. [PMID: 32353861 PMCID: PMC7297956 DOI: 10.1038/s41386-020-0687-y] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/18/2020] [Revised: 04/19/2020] [Accepted: 04/22/2020] [Indexed: 02/05/2023]
Abstract
Schizophrenia (SCZ), bipolar disorder (BD), and major depressive disorder (MDD) are heritable psychiatric disorders with partially overlapping genetic liability. Shared and disorder-specific neurobiological abnormalities associated with familial risk for developing mental illnesses are largely unknown. We performed a meta-analysis of structural brain imaging studies in relatives of patients with SCZ, BD, and MDD to identify overlapping and discrete brain structural correlates of familial risk for mental disorders. Search for voxel-based morphometry studies in relatives of patients with SCZ, BD, and MDD in PubMed and Embase identified 33 studies with 2292 relatives and 2052 healthy controls (HC). Seed-based d Mapping software was used to investigate global differences in gray matter volumes between relatives as a group versus HC, and between those of each psychiatric disorder and HC. As a group, relatives exhibited gray matter abnormalities in left supramarginal gyrus, right striatum, right inferior frontal gyrus, left thalamus, bilateral insula, right cerebellum, and right superior frontal gyrus, compared with HC. Decreased right cerebellar gray matter was the only abnormality common to relatives of all three conditions. Subgroup analyses showed disorder-specific gray matter abnormalities in left thalamus and bilateral insula associated with risk for SCZ, in left supramarginal gyrus and right frontal regions with risk for BD, and in right striatum with risk for MDD. While decreased gray matter in right cerebellum might be a common brain structural abnormality associated with shared risk for SCZ, BD, and MDD, regional gray matter abnormalities in neocortex, thalamus, and striatum appear to be disorder-specific.
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Saarinen AIL, Huhtaniska S, Pudas J, Björnholm L, Jukuri T, Tohka J, Granö N, Barnett JH, Kiviniemi V, Veijola J, Hintsanen M, Lieslehto J. Structural and functional alterations in the brain gray matter among first-degree relatives of schizophrenia patients: A multimodal meta-analysis of fMRI and VBM studies. Schizophr Res 2020; 216:14-23. [PMID: 31924374 DOI: 10.1016/j.schres.2019.12.023] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/04/2019] [Revised: 12/20/2019] [Accepted: 12/20/2019] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
Abstract
OBJECTIVE We conducted a multimodal coordinate-based meta-analysis (CBMA) to investigate structural and functional brain alterations in first-degree relatives of schizophrenia patients (FRs). METHODS We conducted a systematic literature search from electronic databases to find studies that examined differences between FRs and healthy controls using whole-brain functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) or voxel-based morphometry (VBM). A CBMA of 30 fMRI (754 FRs; 959 controls) and 11 VBM (885 FRs; 775 controls) datasets were conducted using the anisotropic effect-size version of signed differential mapping. Further, we conducted separate meta-analyses about functional alterations in different cognitive tasks: social cognition, executive functioning, working memory, and inhibitory control. RESULTS FRs showed higher fMRI activation in the right frontal gyrus during cognitive tasks than healthy controls. In VBM studies, there were no differences in gray matter density between FRs and healthy controls. Furthermore, multi-modal meta-analysis obtained no differences between FRs and healthy controls. By utilizing the BrainMap database, we showed that the brain region which showed functional alterations in FRs (i) overlapped only slightly with the brain regions that were affected in the meta-analysis of schizophrenia patients and (ii) correlated positively with the brain regions that exhibited increased activity during cognitive tasks in healthy individuals. CONCLUSIONS Based on this meta-analysis, FRs may exhibit only minor functional alterations in the brain during cognitive tasks, and the alterations are much more restricted and only slightly overlapping with the regions that are affected in schizophrenia patients. The familial risk did not relate to structural alterations in the gray matter.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aino I L Saarinen
- Research Unit of Psychology, University of Oulu, Finland; Department of Psychology and Logopedics, Faculty of Medicine, University of Helsinki, Finland; Research Unit of Clinical Neuroscience, Department of Psychiatry, University of Oulu, Finland.
| | - Sanna Huhtaniska
- Center for Life Course Health Research, University of Oulu, Finland
| | - Juho Pudas
- Research Unit of Clinical Neuroscience, Department of Psychiatry, University of Oulu, Finland
| | - Lassi Björnholm
- Research Unit of Clinical Neuroscience, Department of Psychiatry, University of Oulu, Finland
| | - Tuomas Jukuri
- Research Unit of Clinical Neuroscience, Department of Psychiatry, University of Oulu, Finland
| | - Jussi Tohka
- A.I. Virtanen Institute for Molecular Sciences, University of Eastern Finland, Kuopio, Finland
| | - Niklas Granö
- Helsinki University Hospital, Department of Adolescent Psychiatry, Finland
| | - Jennifer H Barnett
- Cambridge Cognition, Cambridge, UK; Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
| | - Vesa Kiviniemi
- Department of Diagnostic Radiology, Oulu University Hospital, Oulu, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, Oulu University Hospital, Oulu, Finland
| | - Juha Veijola
- Research Unit of Clinical Neuroscience, Department of Psychiatry, University of Oulu, Finland; Department of Psychiatry, Oulu University Hospital, Oulu, Finland; Medical Research Center Oulu, Oulu University Hospital and University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland
| | | | - Johannes Lieslehto
- Center for Life Course Health Research, University of Oulu, Finland; Section for Neurodiagnostic Applications, Department of Psychiatry, Ludwig Maximilian University, Nussbaumstrasse 7, 80336 Munich, Bavaria, Germany
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Abstract
The genetic architecture of schizophrenia is complex and highly polygenic. This article discusses key findings from genetic studies of childhood-onset schizophrenia (COS) and the more common adult-onset schizophrenia (AOS), including studies of familial aggregation and common, rare, and copy number variants. Extant literature suggests that COS is a rare variant of AOS involving greater familial aggregation of schizophrenia spectrum disorders and a potentially higher occurrence of pathogenic copy number variants. The direct utility of genetics to clinical practice for COS is currently limited; however, identifying common pathways through which risk genes affect brain function offers promise for novel interventions.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jennifer K Forsyth
- Department of Psychiatry & Biobehavioral Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles, 760 Westwood Plaza, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
| | - Robert F Asarnow
- Department of Psychiatry & Biobehavioral Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles, 760 Westwood Plaza, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA; Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, 502 Portola Plaza Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA; Brain Research Institute, University of California, Los Angeles, 695 Charles E Young Dr S, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
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Karcher NR, Hua JPY, Kerns JG. Probabilistic Category Learning and Striatal Functional Activation in Psychosis Risk. Schizophr Bull 2019; 45:396-404. [PMID: 29590478 PMCID: PMC6403050 DOI: 10.1093/schbul/sby033] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/06/2023]
Abstract
BACKGROUND Psychosis risk is associated with striatal dysfunction, including a previous behavioral study that found that psychosis risk is associated with impaired performance on a probabilistic category learning task (PCLT; ie, the Weather Prediction Task), a task strongly associated with striatal activation. The current study examined whether psychosis risk based on symptom levels was associated with both poor behavioral performance and task-related physiological dysfunction in specific regions of the striatum while performing the PCLT. METHODS There were 2 groups of participants: psychosis risk (n = 21) who had both (a) extreme levels of self-reported psychotic-like beliefs and experiences and (b) interview-rated current attenuated psychotic symptoms (APS); and a comparison group (n = 20) who had average levels of self-reported psychotic-like beliefs and experiences. Participants completed the PCLT during fMRI scanning. RESULTS The current research replicated previous work finding behavioral PCLT deficits at the end of the task in psychosis risk. Furthermore, as expected, the psychosis risk group exhibited decreased striatal activation on the task, especially in the associative striatum. The psychosis risk group also displayed decreased activation in a range of cortical regions connected to the associative striatum. In contrast, the psychosis risk group exhibited greater activation predominantly in cortical regions not connected to the associative striatum. CONCLUSIONS Psychosis risk was associated with both behavioral and striatal dysfunction during performance on the PCLT, suggesting that behavioral and imaging measures using this task could be a marker for psychosis risk.
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Affiliation(s)
- Nicole R Karcher
- Department of Psychological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO,Department of Psychiatry, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO,To whom correspondence should be addressed; Department of Psychological Sciences, University of Missouri, 214 McAlester Hall, Columbia, MO 65211; tel: 573-882-8846, fax: 573-882-7710, e-mail:
| | - Jessica P Y Hua
- Department of Psychological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO
| | - John G Kerns
- Department of Psychological Sciences, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO
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Ma Q, Zhang T, Zanetti MV, Shen H, Satterthwaite TD, Wolf DH, Gur RE, Fan Y, Hu D, Busatto GF, Davatzikos C. Classification of multi-site MR images in the presence of heterogeneity using multi-task learning. Neuroimage Clin 2018; 19:476-486. [PMID: 29984156 PMCID: PMC6029565 DOI: 10.1016/j.nicl.2018.04.037] [Citation(s) in RCA: 21] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/22/2017] [Revised: 04/09/2018] [Accepted: 04/28/2018] [Indexed: 12/21/2022]
Abstract
With the advent of Big Data Imaging Analytics applied to neuroimaging, datasets from multiple sites need to be pooled into larger samples. However, heterogeneity across different scanners, protocols and populations, renders the task of finding underlying disease signatures challenging. The current work investigates the value of multi-task learning in finding disease signatures that generalize across studies and populations. Herein, we present a multi-task learning type of formulation, in which different tasks are from different studies and populations being pooled together. We test this approach in an MRI study of the neuroanatomy of schizophrenia (SCZ) by pooling data from 3 different sites and populations: Philadelphia, Sao Paulo and Tianjin (50 controls and 50 patients from each site), which posed integration challenges due to variability in disease chronicity, treatment exposure, and data collection. Some existing methods are also tested for comparison purposes. Experiments show that classification accuracy of multi-site data outperformed that of single-site data and pooled data using multi-task feature learning, and also outperformed other comparison methods. Several anatomical regions were identified to be common discriminant features across sites. These included prefrontal, superior temporal, insular, anterior cingulate cortex, temporo-limbic and striatal regions consistently implicated in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia, as well as the cerebellum, precuneus, and fusiform, middle temporal, inferior parietal, postcentral, angular, lingual and middle occipital gyri. These results indicate that the proposed multi-task learning method is robust in finding consistent and reliable structural brain abnormalities associated with SCZ across different sites, in the presence of multiple sources of heterogeneity.
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Affiliation(s)
- Qiongmin Ma
- College of Mechatronics and Automation, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha, Hunan 410073, China; Center for Biomedical Image Computing and Analytics, and Department of Radiology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, United States; Beijing Institute of System Engineering, China.
| | - Tianhao Zhang
- Center for Biomedical Image Computing and Analytics, and Department of Radiology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, United States
| | - Marcus V Zanetti
- Laboratory of Psychiatric Neuroimaging (LIM-21), Department and Institute of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil
| | - Hui Shen
- College of Mechatronics and Automation, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha, Hunan 410073, China
| | | | - Daniel H Wolf
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, United States
| | - Raquel E Gur
- Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, United States
| | - Yong Fan
- Center for Biomedical Image Computing and Analytics, and Department of Radiology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, United States
| | - Dewen Hu
- College of Mechatronics and Automation, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha, Hunan 410073, China
| | - Geraldo F Busatto
- Laboratory of Psychiatric Neuroimaging (LIM-21), Department and Institute of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil
| | - Christos Davatzikos
- Center for Biomedical Image Computing and Analytics, and Department of Radiology, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA 19104, United States
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Lerner Y, Bleich-Cohen M, Solnik-Knirsh S, Yogev-Seligmann G, Eisenstein T, Madah W, Shamir A, Hendler T, Kremer I. Abnormal neural hierarchy in processing of verbal information in patients with schizophrenia. NEUROIMAGE-CLINICAL 2017; 17:1047-1060. [PMID: 29349038 PMCID: PMC5768152 DOI: 10.1016/j.nicl.2017.12.030] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/22/2017] [Revised: 11/28/2017] [Accepted: 12/20/2017] [Indexed: 01/10/2023]
Abstract
Previous research indicates abnormal comprehension of verbal information in patients with schizophrenia. Yet the neural mechanism underlying the breakdown of verbal information processing in schizophrenia is poorly understood. Imaging studies in healthy populations have shown a network of brain areas involved in hierarchical processing of verbal information over time. Here, we identified critical aspects of this hierarchy, examining patients with schizophrenia. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we examined various levels of information comprehension elicited by naturally presented verbal stimuli; from a set of randomly shuffled words to an intact story. Specifically, patients with first episode schizophrenia (N = 15), their non-manifesting siblings (N = 14) and healthy controls (N = 15) listened to a narrated story and randomly scrambled versions of it. To quantify the degree of dissimilarity between the groups, we adopted an inter-subject correlation (inter-SC) approach, which estimates differences in synchronization of neural responses within and between groups. The temporal topography found in healthy and siblings groups were consistent with our previous findings - high synchronization in responses from early sensory toward high order perceptual and cognitive areas. In patients with schizophrenia, stimuli with short and intermediate temporal scales evoked a typical pattern of reliable responses, whereas story condition (long temporal scale) revealed robust and widespread disruption of the inter-SCs. In addition, the more similar the neural activity of patients with schizophrenia was to the average response in the healthy group, the less severe the positive symptoms of the patients. Our findings suggest that system-level neural indication of abnormal verbal information processing in schizophrenia reflects disease manifestations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yulia Lerner
- Tel Aviv Center for Brain Functions, Tel Aviv, Sourasky Medical Center, Tel Aviv, Israel; The Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel; Sagol School of Neurosceince, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel.
| | - Maya Bleich-Cohen
- Tel Aviv Center for Brain Functions, Tel Aviv, Sourasky Medical Center, Tel Aviv, Israel
| | - Shimrit Solnik-Knirsh
- Tel Aviv Center for Brain Functions, Tel Aviv, Sourasky Medical Center, Tel Aviv, Israel
| | - Galit Yogev-Seligmann
- Tel Aviv Center for Brain Functions, Tel Aviv, Sourasky Medical Center, Tel Aviv, Israel; The Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel
| | - Tamir Eisenstein
- Tel Aviv Center for Brain Functions, Tel Aviv, Sourasky Medical Center, Tel Aviv, Israel; The Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel
| | | | - Alon Shamir
- MAZOR Mental Health Center, Acre, Israel; The Ruth and Bruce Rappaport Faculty of Medicine, Technion, Haifa, Israel
| | - Talma Hendler
- Tel Aviv Center for Brain Functions, Tel Aviv, Sourasky Medical Center, Tel Aviv, Israel; The Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel; Sagol School of Neurosceince, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel; School of Psychological Sciences, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel
| | - Ilana Kremer
- MAZOR Mental Health Center, Acre, Israel; The Ruth and Bruce Rappaport Faculty of Medicine, Technion, Haifa, Israel
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Waltzman D, Knowlton BJ, Cohen JR, Bookheimer SY, Bilder RM, Asarnow RF. DTI microstructural abnormalities in adolescent siblings of patients with childhood-onset schizophrenia. Psychiatry Res Neuroimaging 2016; 258:23-29. [PMID: 27829189 DOI: 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2016.10.010] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/29/2016] [Revised: 10/25/2016] [Accepted: 10/28/2016] [Indexed: 12/15/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Dana Waltzman
- War Related Illness and Injury Study Center, Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System (VAPAHCS), United States; Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University School of Medicine, United States.
| | | | - Jessica Rachel Cohen
- Department of Psychology and Neurosciences, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, United States
| | - Susan Yost Bookheimer
- David Geffen School of Medicine at University of California Los Angeles, United States
| | - Robert Martin Bilder
- David Geffen School of Medicine at University of California Los Angeles, United States
| | - Robert Franklin Asarnow
- Department of Psychology, University of California Los Angeles, United States; David Geffen School of Medicine at University of California Los Angeles, United States
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Karcher NR, Martin EA, Kerns JG. Examining associations between psychosis risk, social anhedonia, and performance of striatum-related behavioral tasks. JOURNAL OF ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY 2016; 124:507-18. [PMID: 26075968 DOI: 10.1037/abn0000067] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/08/2022]
Abstract
Both psychosis and anhedonia have been associated to some extent with striatal functioning. The current study examined whether either psychosis risk or social anhedonia was associated with performance on 3 tasks related to striatal functioning. Psychosis risk participants had extremely elevated Perceptual Aberration/Magical Ideation (PerMag) scores (n = 69), with 43% of psychosis risk participants also having semistructured interview-assessed psychotic-like experiences which further heightens their risk of psychotic disorder (Chapman, Chapman, Kwapil, Eckblad, & Zinser, 1994). Compared with both extremely elevated social anhedonia (n = 60) and control (n = 68) groups, the PerMag group exhibited poorer performance on 2 of the striatum-related tasks, the Weather Prediction Task (WPT) and the Learned Irrelevance Paradigm, but not on Finger Tapping. In addition, PerMag participants with psychotic-like experiences were especially impaired on the WPT. Overall, this study arguably provides the first evidence that psychosis risk but not social anhedonia is associated with performance on the WPT, a task thought to be strongly associated with activation in the associative striatum, and also suggests that the WPT might be especially useful as a behavioral measure of psychosis risk.
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Abstract
Childhood-onset schizophrenia is a rare pediatric onset psychiatric disorder continuous with and typically more severe than its adult counterpart. Neuroimaging research conducted on this population has revealed similarly severe neural abnormalities. When taken as a whole, neuroimaging research in this population shows generally decreased cortical gray matter coupled with white matter connectivity abnormalities, suggesting an anatomical basis for deficits in executive function. Subcortical abnormalities are pronounced in limbic structures, where volumetric deficits are likely related to social skill deficits, and cerebellar deficits that have been correlated to cognitive abnormalities. Structures relevant to motor processing also show a significant alteration, with volumetric increase in basal ganglia structures likely due to antipsychotic administration. Neuroimaging of this disorder shows an important clinical image of exaggerated cortical loss, altered white matter connectivity, and differences in structural development of subcortical areas during the course of development and provides important background to the disease state.
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