Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy neurobiology in treatment-resistant obsessive-compulsive disorder: A domain-related resting-state networks approach

Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) stands out as a promising augmentation psychological therapy for patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). To identify potential predictive and response biomarkers, this study examines the relationship between clinical domains and resting-state network connectivity in OCD patients undergoing a 3-month MBCT programme. Twelve OCD patients underwent two resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging sessions at baseline and after the MBCT programme. We assessed four clinical domains: positive affect, negative affect, anxiety sensitivity, and rumination. Independent component analysis characterised resting-state networks (RSNs), and multiple regression analyses evaluated brain-clinical associations. At baseline, distinct network connectivity patterns were found for each clinical domain: parietal-subcortical, lateral prefrontal, medial prefrontal, and frontal-occipital. Predictive and response biomarkers revealed significant brain-clinical associations within two main RSNs: the ventral default mode network (vDMN) and the frontostriatal network (FSN). Key brain nodes -the precuneus and the frontopolar cortex- were identified within these networks. MBCT may modulate vDMN and FSN connectivity in OCD patients, possibly reducing symptoms across clinical domains. Each clinical domain had a unique baseline brain connectivity pattern, suggesting potential symptom-based biomarkers. Using these RSNs as predictors could enable personalised treatments and the identification of patients who would benefit most from MBCT.

On the relationship between unprompted thought and affective well-being: A systematic review and meta-analysis

There is a growing recognition that thoughts often arise independently of external demands. These thoughts can span from reminiscing your last vacation to contemplating career goals to fantasizing about meeting your favorite musician. Often referred to as mind wandering, such frequently occurring unprompted thoughts have widespread impact on our daily functions, with the dominant narrative converging on a negative relationship between unprompted thought and affective well-being. In this systematic review of 76 studies, we implemented a meta-analysis and qualitative review to elucidate if and when unprompted thought is indeed negatively associated with affective well-being in adults. Using a multilevel mixed-model approach on 386 effect sizes from 23,168 participants across 64 studies, our meta-analyses indicated an overall relationship between unprompted thought and worse affective well-being (r¯ = -.18, 95% CI [-.23, -.14]); however, the magnitude and direction of this relationship changed when considering specific aspects of the phenomenon (including thought content and intentionality) and methodological approaches (including questionnaires vs. experience sampling). The qualitative review further contextualizes this relationship by revealing the nuances of how and when unprompted thought is associated with affective well-being. Taken together, our meta-analysis and qualitative review indicate that the commonly reported relationship between unprompted thought and affective well-being is contingent upon the content and conceptualization of unprompted thought, as well as the methodological and analytic approaches implemented. Based on these findings, we propose emerging directions for future empirical and theoretical work that highlight the importance of accounting for when, how, and for whom unprompted thought is associated with affective well-being. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Retrieving autobiographical memories in autobiographical contexts: are age-related differences in narrated episodic specificity present outside of the laboratory?

The Autobiographical Interview, a method for evaluating detailed memory of real-world events, reliably detects differences in episodic specificity at retrieval between young and older adults in the laboratory. Whether this age-associated reduction in episodic specificity for autobiographical event retrieval is present outside of the laboratory remains poorly understood. We used a videoconference format to administer the Autobiographical Interview to cognitively unimpaired older adults (N = 49, M = 69.5, SD = 5.94) and young adults (N = 54, M = 22.5, SD = 4.19) who were in their homes at the time of retrieval. Relative to young adults, older adults showed reduced episodic specificity in their home environment, as reflected by fewer episodic or "internal" details (t (101) = 3.23, p = 0.009) and more "external" details (i.e., semantic, language-based details) (t (101) = 3.60, p = 0.003). These findings, along with detail subtype profiles in the narratives, bolster the ecological validity of the Autobiographical Interview and add promise to the use of virtual cognitive testing to improve the accessibility, participant diversity, scalability, and ecological validity of memory research.

Recent advances in the neuroscience of spontaneous and off-task thought: implications for mental health

People spend a remarkable 30-50% of awake life thinking about something other than what they are currently doing. These experiences of being "off-task" can be described as spontaneous thought when mental dynamics are relatively flexible. Here we review recent neuroscience developments in this area and consider implications for mental wellbeing and illness. We provide updated overviews of the roles of the default mode network and large-scale network dynamics, and we discuss emerging candidate mechanisms involving hippocampal memory (sharp-wave ripples, replay) and neuromodulatory (noradrenergic and serotonergic) systems. We explore how distinct brain states can be associated with or give rise to adaptive and maladaptive forms of thought linked to distinguishable mental health outcomes. We conclude by outlining new directions in the neuroscience of spontaneous and off-task thought that may clarify mechanisms, lead to personalized biomarkers, and facilitate therapy developments toward the goals of better understanding and improving mental health.

Brain mediators of biased social learning of self-perception in social anxiety disorder

Social anxiety disorder (SAD) is characterized by an excessive fear of social evaluation and a persistently negative view of the self. Here we test the hypothesis that negative biases in brain responses and in social learning of self-related information contribute to the negative self-image and low self-esteem characteristic of SAD. Adult participants diagnosed with social anxiety (N = 21) and matched controls (N = 23) rated their performance and received social feedback following a stressful public speaking task. We investigated how positive versus negative social feedback altered self-evaluation and state self-esteem and used functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to characterize brain responses to positive versus negative feedback. Compared to controls, participants with SAD updated their self-evaluation and state self-esteem significantly more based on negative compared to positive social feedback. Responses in the frontoparietal network correlated with and mirrored these behavioral effects, with greater responses to positive than negative feedback in non-anxious controls but not in participants with SAD. Responses to social feedback in the anterior insula and other areas mediated the effects of negative versus positive feedback on changes in self-evaluation. In non-anxious participants, frontoparietal brain areas may contribute to a positive social learning bias. In SAD, frontoparietal areas are less recruited overall and less attuned to positive feedback, possibly reflecting differences in attention allocation and cognitive regulation. More negatively biased brain responses and social learning could contribute to maintaining a negative self-image in SAD and other internalizing disorders, thereby offering important new targets for interventions.

A dorsomedial prefrontal cortex-based dynamic functional connectivity model of rumination

Rumination is a cognitive style characterized by repetitive thoughts about one's negative internal states and is a common symptom of depression. Previous studies have linked trait rumination to alterations in the default mode network, but predictive brain markers of rumination are lacking. Here, we adopt a predictive modeling approach to develop a neuroimaging marker of rumination based on the variance of dynamic resting-state functional connectivity and test it across 5 diverse subclinical and clinical samples (total n = 288). A whole-brain marker based on dynamic connectivity with the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC) emerges as generalizable across the subclinical datasets. A refined marker consisting of the most important features from a virtual lesion analysis further predicts depression scores of adults with major depressive disorder (n = 35). This study highlights the role of the dmPFC in trait rumination and provides a dynamic functional connectivity marker for rumination.

Dreams share phenomenological similarities with task-unrelated thoughts and relate to variation in trait rumination and COVID-19 concern

While recent neurocognitive theories have proposed links between dreams and waking life, it remains unclear what kinds of waking thoughts are most similar in their phenomenological characteristics to those of dreams. To investigate this question and examine relevance of dreams to significant personal concerns and dispositional mental health traits, we employed ecological momentary assessment and trait questionnaires across 719 young adults who completed the study during the COVID-19 pandemic, a time marked by considerable societal concern. Across the group and at the level of individual differences, dreams showed the highest correspondence with task-unrelated thoughts. Participants who self-reported greater COVID-19 concern rated their dreams as more negative and unconstructive, a relationship which was moderated by trait rumination. Furthermore, dreams perceived as more negative unconstructive and immersive in nature associated with increased trait rumination beyond variation in rumination explained by waking task-unrelated thoughts alone. Together, these results point to similarities between perceived characteristics of dreams and task-unrelated thoughts, and support a relationship between dreams, current concerns, and mental health.

Insights into the accuracy of social scientists' forecasts of societal change

How well can social scientists predict societal change, and what processes underlie their predictions? To answer these questions, we ran two forecasting tournaments testing the accuracy of predictions of societal change in domains commonly studied in the social sciences: ideological preferences, political polarization, life satisfaction, sentiment on social media, and gender-career and racial bias. After we provided them with historical trend data on the relevant domain, social scientists submitted pre-registered monthly forecasts for a year (Tournament 1; N = 86 teams and 359 forecasts), with an opportunity to update forecasts on the basis of new data six months later (Tournament 2; N = 120 teams and 546 forecasts). Benchmarking forecasting accuracy revealed that social scientists' forecasts were on average no more accurate than those of simple statistical models (historical means, random walks or linear regressions) or the aggregate forecasts of a sample from the general public (N = 802). However, scientists were more accurate if they had scientific expertise in a prediction domain, were interdisciplinary, used simpler models and based predictions on prior data.

Past and future episodic detail retrieval is reduced among clinically normal older adults at higher genetic risk for late-onset Alzheimer's disease

OBJECTIVE

Remembering and imagining personal events that are rich in episodic (i.e., event-specific) detail is compromised in older adults who have mild cognitive impairment, a known risk factor for Alzheimer's disease dementia. Less clear is whether lower episodic detail generation is associated with higher risk for Alzheimer's disease dementia before mild clinical decline is detectable.

METHOD

We compared past and future autobiographical thinking in clinically normal older adult carriers of the Alzheimer's disease-associated apolipoprotein E e4 allele (APOE4; n = 39) to demographically and neuropsychologically similar non-APOE4 carriers (n = 43).

RESULTS

APOE4 carriers showed a significant reduction for episodic details when remembering past events (d = .47) and imagining future events (d = .46), but not for nonepisodic details.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings suggest that APOE4 is associated with a selective reduction of episodic detail during past and future autobiographical thinking among clinically normal older adults. Reduced episodic detail generation, therefore, may be an early cognitive associate of higher risk for Alzheimer's disease dementia. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Functional connectivity with medial temporal regions differs across cultures during post-encoding rest

Connectivity of the brain at rest can reflect individual differences and impact behavioral outcomes, including memory. The present study investigated how culture influences functional connectivity with regions of the medial temporal lobe. In this study, 46 Americans and 59 East Asians completed a resting state scan after encoding pictures of objects. To investigate cross-cultural differences in resting state functional connectivity, left parahippocampal gyrus (anterior and posterior regions) and left hippocampus were selected as seed regions. These regions were selected, because they were previously implicated in a study of cultural differences during the successful encoding of detailed memories. Results revealed that left posterior parahippocampal gyrus had stronger connectivity with temporo-occipital regions for East Asians compared with Americans and stronger connectivity with parieto-occipital regions for Americans compared with East Asians. Left anterior parahippocampal gyrus had stronger connectivity with temporal regions for East Asians than Americans and stronger connectivity with frontal regions for Americans than East Asians. Although connectivity did not relate to memory performance, patterns did relate to cultural values. The degree of independent self-construal and subjective value of tradition were associated with functional connectivity involving left anterior parahippocampal gyrus. Findings are discussed in terms of potential cultural differences in memory consolidation or more general trait or state-based processes, such as holistic versus analytic processing.

Task-unrelated thought increases after consumption of COVID-19 and general news

Task-unrelated thoughts (TUTs) are frequent distractions from our everyday tasks, which can reduce productivity and safety during task performance. This necessitates the examination of factors that modulate TUT occurrence in daily life. One factor that has previously been implicated as a source of TUT is personally salient concerns. External factors such as news media serve as cues for these concerns, potentially increasing TUT occurrence. However, this has not been thoroughly examined in everyday life settings. We thus utilized Ecological Momentary Assessment to survey participants throughout the day for ten days, on their TUTs and news consumption in two separate studies. Study 1 focused on the impact of news related to the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) pandemic, as a common and global concern. We found that TUT occurrence was significantly predicted by COVID-19 news consumption, such that TUT occurrence increased with COVID-19 news consumption. To extend these findings, we implemented Study 2 using similar methods, but focusing on the consumption of news media in general. TUT occurrence was predicted by general news consumption, with an increase in reports of TUT following consumption of news media in general. We thus extended the association found between TUT and COVID-19-related news in Study 1, to any news topic in Study 2. We speculate that the increase in TUTs was due to heightened salience of current concerns, cued by the news. These findings highlight the importance of considering when we choose to consume news media and the value of examining contextual factors when studying TUTs in daily life.

Efficacy and fMRI-based response predictors to mindfulness-based cognitive therapy in obsessive-compulsive disorder: Study protocol for a randomised clinical trial

BACKGROUND

Around 40-50% of patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) suffer from obsessions and compulsions after receiving first-line treatments. Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) has been proposed as a reasonable augmentation strategy for OCD. MBCT trains to decentre from distressful thoughts and emotions by focusing on them voluntarily and with consciousness. This practice develops alternative ways to deal with obsessions, which could increase non-reactivity behaviours and, in turn, reduce compulsions. This study aims to investigate the efficacy of MBCT to improve OCD symptoms. Secondly, it pursues to investigate which socio-demographic, clinical, and neurobiological characteristics mediate or moderate the MBCT response; and identify potential biomarkers of positive/negative response.

METHODS

This study is a randomised clinical trial (RCT) of 60 OCD patients who do not respond to first-line treatments. Participants will be randomised to either an MBCT program or treatment as usual. The MBCT group will undergo 10 weekly sessions of 120min. Principal outcome: change in OCD severity symptoms using clinician and self-reported measures. Also, participants will undergo a comprehensive evaluation assessing comorbid clinical variables, neuropsychological functioning and thought content. Finally, a comprehensive neuroimaging protocol using structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging will be acquired in a 3T scanner. All data will be obtained at baseline and post-intervention.

DISCUSSION

This study will assess the efficacy of mindfulness in OCD patients who do not achieve clinical recovery after usual treatment. It is the first RCT in this subject examining clinical, neuropsychological and neuroimaging variables to examine the neural patterns associated with the MBCT response.

CLINICAL TRIALS REGISTRATION

NCT03128749.

When self comes to a wandering mind: Brain representations and dynamics of self-generated concepts in spontaneous thought

Self-relevant concepts are major building blocks of spontaneous thought, and their dynamics in a natural stream of thought are likely to reveal one's internal states that are important for mental health. Here, we conducted a functional magnetic resonance imaging experiment (n = 62) to examine brain representations and dynamics of self-generated concepts in the context of spontaneous thought using a newly developed free association-based thought sampling task. The dynamics of conceptual associations were predictive of individual differences in general negative affectivity, replicating across multiple datasets (n = 196). Reflecting on self-generated concepts strongly engaged brain regions linked to autobiographical memory, conceptual processes, emotion, and autonomic regulation, including the medial prefrontal and medial temporal subcortical structures. Multivariate pattern-based predictive modeling revealed that the neural representations of valence became more person-specific as the level of perceived self-relevance increased. Overall, this study sheds light on how self-generated concepts in spontaneous thought construct inner affective states and idiosyncrasies.

Associations Between Age and Resting State Connectivity Are Partially Dependent Upon Cardiovascular Fitness

Previous research suggests a marked impact of aging on structural and functional connectivity within the frontoparietal control network (FPCN) and default mode network (DMN). As aging is also associated with reductions in cardiovascular fitness, age-related network connectivity differences reported by past studies could be partially due to age-related declines in fitness. Here, we use data collected as part of a 16-week exercise intervention to explore relationships between fitness and functional connectivity. Young and older adults completed baseline assessments including cardiovascular fitness, health and functioning measures, and an fMRI session. Scan data were acquired on a Siemens 3T MRI scanner with a 32-channel head coil. Results from regression analyses indicated that average connectivity did not differ between young and older adults. However, individual ROI-to-ROI connectivity analyses indicated weaker functional correlations for older adults between specific regions in the FPCN and DMN and, critically, many of these differences were attenuated when fitness was accounted for. Taken together, findings suggest that fitness exerts regional rather than global effects on network connectivity.

The conceptual building blocks of everyday thought: Tracking the emergence and dynamics of ruminative and nonruminative thinking

How do thoughts arise, unfold, and change over time? Are the contents and dynamics of everyday thought rooted in conceptual associations within one's semantic networks? To address these questions, we developed the Free Association Semantic task (FAST), whereby participants generate dynamic chains of conceptual associations in response to seed words that vary in valence. Ninety-four adults from a community sample completed the FAST task and additionally described and rated six of their most frequently occurring everyday thoughts. Text analysis and valence ratings revealed similarities in thematic and affective content between FAST concept chains and recurrent autobiographical thoughts. Dynamic analyses revealed that individuals higher in rumination were more strongly attracted to negative conceptual spaces and more likely to remain there longer. Overall, these findings provide quantitative evidence that conceptual associations may act as a semantic scaffold for more complex everyday thoughts, and that more negative and less dynamic conceptual associations in ruminative individuals mirror maladaptive repetitive thoughts in daily life. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Individual differences in the relationship between episodic detail generation and resting state functional connectivity vary with age

The ability to generate episodic details while recollecting autobiographical events is believed to depend on a collection of brain regions that form a posterior medial network (PMN). How age-related differences in episodic detail generation relate to the PMN, however, remains unclear. The present study sought to examine individual differences, and the role of age, in PMN resting state functional connectivity (rsFC) associations with episodic detail generation. Late middle-aged and older adults (N = 41, ages 52-81), and young adults (N = 21, ages 19-35) were asked to describe recent personal events, and these memory narratives were coded for episodic, semantic and 'miscellaneous' details. Independent components analysis and regions-of-interest analyses were used to assess rsFC within the PMN separately for anterior connections (hippocampal and medial prefrontal) and posterior connections (hippocampal, parahippocampal and parieto-occipital), as these connections purportedly serve different functional roles in episodic detail generation. Compared to younger adults, older adults produced memory narratives with lower episodic specificity (ratio of episodic:total details) and a greater amount of semantic detail. Among the older adults, episodic detail amounts and episodic specificity were reduced with increasing age. There were no significant age differences in PMN rsFC. Stronger anterior PMN rsFC was related to lower episodic detail in the older adult group, but not in the young. Among the older adults, increasing age brought on an association between increased anterior PMN rsFC and reduced episodic specificity. In contrast, increasing age brought on an association between increased posterior PMN rsFC and increased semantic detail. The present study provides evidence that functional connectivity within the PMN, particularly anterior PMN, tracks individual differences in the amount of episodic details retrieved by older adults. Furthermore, these brain-behavior relationships appear to be age-specific, indicating that some process within aging alters the nature of how anterior PMN rsFC and episodic detail relate to each other. Whether this process entails an age-related loss of integrity to the PMN, or an age-related shift toward semantic retrieval, remains to be determined.

Variation is the Norm: Brain State Dynamics Evoked By Emotional Video Clips

For the last several decades, emotion research has attempted to identify a "biomarker" or consistent pattern of brain activity to characterize a single category of emotion (e.g., fear) that will remain consistent across all instances of that category, regardless of individual and context. In this study, we investigated variation rather than consistency during emotional experiences while people watched video clips chosen to evoke instances of specific emotion categories. Specifically, we developed a sequential probabilistic approach to model the temporal dynamics in a participant's brain activity during video viewing. We characterized brain states during these clips as distinct state occupancy periods between state transitions in blood oxygen level dependent (BOLD) signal patterns. We found substantial variation in the state occupancy probability distributions across individuals watching the same video, supporting the hypothesis that when it comes to the brain correlates of emotional experience, variation may indeed be the norm.

Daily mindfulness training reduces negative impact of COVID-19 news exposure on affective well-being

COVID-19 has led to mental health adversities worldwide. The current study examined whether daily practice of brief mindfulness training has a beneficial impact on affective well-being, and mitigates the negative impact of exposure to COVID-19 news during the pandemic. Participants were randomly assigned into a mindfulness training (MT) group or a waitlist control (WC) group. Participants in the MT group practiced guided mindfulness meditation for a minimum of 10 min each day for 10 days. Both groups completed questionnaires assessing well-being at baseline and after the 10-day period. We also included four ecological momentary assessments (EMA) interspersed throughout the day to measure fine-grained affective states and recent exposure to COVID-19-related news, which has been linked to negative affect. We observed an increase in positive affect in the MT group compared to the WC group in the post-training assessment. However, no group differences emerged in the other three post-training affective measures of negative affect, anxiety and depression. EMA revealed that the MT group also showed more positive affective valence than the WC group across the 10 days. Notably, the WC group reported more negative affective valence following COVID-19 news exposure, whereas the MT group was not impacted. Taken together, our study indicates brief sessions of guided mindfulness meditation during COVID-19 may boost positive affect and serve as a protective buffer against the negative impact of exposure to COVID-19-related news on affective well-being. These findings highlight the utility of mindfulness meditation as an accessible and cost-effective technique to elevate positive affect amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.

Effects of Compassion Training on Brain Responses to Suffering other

Compassion meditation (CM) is a promising intervention for enhancing compassion, although its active ingredients and neurobiological mechanisms are not well-understood. To investigate these, we conducted a three-armed placebo-controlled randomized trial (N = 57) with longitudinal functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We compared a 4-week CM program delivered by smartphone application with (i) a placebo condition, presented to participants as the compassion-enhancing hormone oxytocin, and (ii) a condition designed to control for increased familiarity with suffering others, an element of CM which may promote compassion. At pre- and post-intervention, participants listened to compassion-eliciting narratives describing suffering others during fMRI. CM increased brain responses to suffering others in the medial orbitofrontal cortex (mOFC) relative to the familiarity condition, p < 0.05 family-wise error rate corrected. Among CM participants, individual differences in increased mOFC responses positively correlated with increased compassion-related feelings and attributions, r = 0.50, p = 0.04. Relative to placebo, the CM group exhibited a similar increase in mOFC activity at an uncorrected threshold of P < 0.001 and 10 contiguous voxels. We conclude that the mOFC, a region closely related to affiliative affect and motivation, is an important brain mechanism of CM. Effects of CM on mOFC function are not explained by familiarity effects and are partly explained by placebo effects.

How task-unrelated and freely moving thought relate to affect: Evidence for dissociable patterns in everyday life

Much of our knowledge about the correlates of mind-wandering comes from assessing task-unrelated thought. Less is known about the correlates of freely moving thought, a dimension that assesses the degree to which thoughts arise and unfold with low levels of guidance or constraints. Task-unrelated thought is consistently associated with more negative affective valence compared with being on task; however, it is unclear whether freely moving thought shares the same relationship with affect. We conducted two ecological momentary assessment studies in the context of everyday life and found that the two dimensions have different affective correlates. In Study 1, task-unrelated thought was associated with less positive concurrent valence than being on-task. However, freely moving thought was associated with more positive concurrent valence and was predictive of more positive valence at a subsequent timepoint. Freely moving thought, but not task-unrelated thought, also positively predicted concurrent arousal. Computational sentiment analyses of participants' thought descriptions offered convergent evidence of differential relationships between the two thought dimensions and affect. Study 2 used different measurement scales to assess whether (a) the pattern of findings replicated and (b) if the effects were robust to changes in measurement. The main findings were replicated: task-unrelated thought was negatively associated with concurrent valence, whereas freely moving thought was positively associated with concurrent valence. However, freely moving thought did not predict subsequent valence and was not related to concurrent arousal. The most robust findings related to concurrent valence. Although mind-wandering has acquired a relatively negative reputation to date, our findings suggest that there might be positive aspects that remain unexplored. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Mapping the imaginative mind: Charting new paths forward

The fields of psychology and neuroscience are in the midst of an explosion of research seeking to understand human imagination - the ability to form thoughts and mental images that stretch beyond what is currently available to the senses. Imaginative thought is proving to be remarkably diverse, capturing the capacity to recall past experiences, consider what lies ahead, and understand others' minds, in addition to other forms of creative and spontaneous thinking. In the first part of this article, we introduce an integrative framework that attempts to explain how components of a core brain network facilitate interacting features of imagination that we refer to as the "mind's eye" and "mind's mind." We then highlight three emerging research directions that could inform our understanding of how imagination arises and unfolds in everyday life.

Off-task thinking among adults with and without social anxiety disorder: an ecological momentary assessment study

Although task-unrelated thinking (often conceptualised as "mind-wandering") has been increasingly investigated in recent years, the content and correlates of everyday off-task thought in clinical disorders, particularly anxiety disorders, remain poorly understood. We aimed to address this gap by using ecological momentary assessment to assess off-task and on-task thoughts in adults with social anxiety disorder (SAD) and demographically matched controls. Findings showed that individuals with SAD more frequently engaged in internally oriented off-task thinking than healthy controls, but not externally oriented off-task thinking. Compared to thoughts focused on the task at hand, adults with SAD rated their internal off-task thoughts as less controllable, more self-focused, and as associated with worse mood than controls. However, when the SAD group was focused on the task at hand, group differences disappeared. Daily findings were paralleled by higher scores in SAD on a trait measure of unintentional, but not intentional, mind-wandering. In sum, the content and mood correlate of internally oriented off-task thoughts depended on the presence of clinical anxiety. In addition, focusing on the task at hand normalised thought content and mood in SAD, highlighting a window for intervention.

Emotion matters: The influence of valence on episodic future thinking in young and older adults

In young adults, valence not only alters the degree to which future events are imagined in rich episodic detail, but also how memorable these events are later on. For older adults, how valence influences episodic detail generation while imagining future events, or recalling these details at another time, remains unclear. We investigated the effect of valence on the specificity and memorability of episodic future thinking (EFT) in young and older adults. Among young and older adults, negative EFT was accompanied by less episodic detail generation relative to positive and neutral EFT. A similar reduction in episodic specificity for negative EFT was found two days later when participants recalled their previously imagined events. Notably, while older adults generated less episodically specific future thoughts relative to young adults, age did not influence the effect of valence on episodic detail generation at imagination or recollection.

Eavesdropping on Autobiographical Memory: A Naturalistic Observation Study of Older Adults' Memory Sharing in Daily Conversations

The retrieval of autobiographical memories is an integral part of everyday social interactions. Prior laboratory research has revealed that older age is associated with a reduction in the retrieval of autobiographical episodic memories, and the ability to elaborate these memories with episodic details. However, how age-related reductions in episodic specificity unfold in everyday social contexts remains largely unknown. Also, constraints of the laboratory-based approach have limited our understanding of how autobiographical semantic memory is linked to older age. To address these gaps in knowledge, we used a smartphone application known as the Electronically Activated Recorder, or “EAR,” to unobtrusively capture real-world conversations over 4 days. In a sample of 102 cognitively normal older adults, we extracted instances where memories and future thoughts were shared by the participants, and we scored the shared episodic memories and future thoughts for their make-up of episodic and semantic detail. We found that older age was associated with a reduction in real-world sharing of autobiographical episodic and semantic memories. We also found that older age was linked to less episodically and semantically detailed descriptions of autobiographical episodic memories. Frequency and level of detail of shared future thoughts yielded weaker relationships with age, which may be related to the low frequency of future thoughts in general. Similar to laboratory research, there was no correlation between autobiographical episodic detail sharing and a standard episodic memory test. However, in contrast to laboratory studies, episodic detail production while sharing autobiographical episodic memories was weakly related to episodic detail production while describing future events, unrelated to working memory, and not different between men and women. Overall, our findings provide novel evidence of how older age relates to episodic specificity when autobiographical memories are assessed unobtrusively and objectively “in the wild.”

Transdiagnostic and disease-specific abnormalities in the default-mode network hubs in psychiatric disorders: A meta-analysis of resting-state functional imaging studies

Background.

The default mode network (DMN) dysfunction has emerged as a consistent biological correlate of multiple psychiatric disorders. Specifically, there is evidence of alterations in DMN cohesiveness in schizophrenia, mood and anxiety disorders. The aim of this study was to synthesize at a fine spatial resolution the intra-network functional connectivity of the DMN in adults diagnosed with schizophrenia, mood and anxiety disorders, capitalizing on powerful meta-analytic tools provided by activation likelihood estimation.

Methods.

Results from 70 whole-brain resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging articles published during the last 15 years were included comprising observations from 2,789 patients and 3,002 healthy controls.

Results.

Specific regional changes in DMN cohesiveness located in the anteromedial and posteromedial cortex emerged as shared and trans-diagnostic brain phenotypes. Disease-specific dysconnectivity was also identified. Unmedicated patients showed more DMN functional alterations, highlighting the importance of interventions targeting the functional integration of the DMN.

Conclusion.

This study highlights functional alteration in the major hubs of the DMN, suggesting common abnormalities in self-referential mental activity across psychiatric disorders.

Neural and sociocultural mediators of ethnic differences in pain

Understanding ethnic differences in pain is important for addressing disparities in pain care. A common belief is that African Americans are hyposensitive to pain compared to Whites, but African Americans show increased pain sensitivity in clinical and laboratory settings. The neurobiological mechanisms underlying these differences are unknown. We studied an ethnicity- and gender-balanced sample of African Americans, Hispanics and non-Hispanic Whites using functional magnetic resonance imaging during thermal pain. Higher pain report in African Americans was mediated by discrimination and increased frontostriatal circuit activations associated with pain rating, discrimination, experimenter trust and extranociceptive aspects of pain elsewhere. In contrast, the neurologic pain signature, a neuromarker sensitive and specific to nociceptive pain, mediated painful heat effects on pain report largely similarly in African American and other groups. Findings identify a brain basis for higher pain in African Americans related to interpersonal context and extranociceptive central pain mechanisms and suggest that nociceptive pain processing may be similar across ethnicities.

Resting state connectivity dynamics in individuals at risk for psychosis

Clarifying dynamic fluctuations in resting-state connectivity in individuals at risk for psychosis (termed clinical high risk [CHR]) may inform understanding of psychotic disorders, such as schizophrenia, which have been associated with dysconnectivity and aberrant salience processing. Dynamic functional connectivity (DFC) investigations provide insight into how neural networks exchange information over time. Currently, there are no published DFC studies involving CHR individuals. This is notable, because understanding how networks may come together and disassociate over time could lend insight into the neural communication that underlies psychosis development and symptomatology. A sliding-window analysis was utilized to examine DFC (defined as the standard deviation over a series of sliding windows) in resting-state scans in a total of 31 CHR individuals and 28 controls. Clinical assessments at baseline and 12 months later were conducted. CHR participants exhibited less DFC (lower standard deviation) in connectivity involving areas of both the salience network (SN) and default mode network (DMN) with regions involved in sensory, motor, attention, and internal cognitive functions relative to controls. Within CHR participants, this pattern was associated with greater positive symptoms 12 months later, possibly reflecting a mechanism behind aberrant salience processing. Higher SN-DMN internetwork DFC related to elevated baseline negative symptoms, anxiety, and depression in CHR participants, which may indicate neurological processes underlying worry and rumination. Overall, through highlighting unique DFC properties within CHR individuals and detecting informative links with clinically relevant symptomatology, results support dysconnectivity and aberrant salience processing models of psychosis. (PsycINFO Database Record

Age-related changes in the temporal focus and self-referential content of spontaneous cognition during periods of low cognitive demand

An intriguing aspect of human cognition is the unique capacity to mentally retreat from our immediate surroundings to consider perspectives distinct from the here and now. Despite increasing interest in this phenomenon, relatively little is known regarding age-related changes in off-task, self-generated thought (often referred to as "mind-wandering"), particularly under conditions of low cognitive demand. While a number of studies have investigated the temporal orientation of mind-wandering with increasing age, findings have been largely inconsistent. Here, we explored the frequency, temporal focus, and self-referential/social content of spontaneous task-unrelated, perceptually decoupled thought in 30 young and 33 healthy older adults using the Shape Expectations task, a validated experimental paradigm in which discrete facets of inner mentation are quantified along a conceptual continuum using open-ended report. Participants also completed the daydreaming subscale of the Imaginal Process Inventory (IPI) as a trait measure of mind-wandering propensity. Significant group differences emerged on the Shape Expectations task, with reduced instances of mind-wandering in the context of elevated task-related thoughts relative to younger adults. In terms of temporal focus, a preponderance of present/atemporal off-task thoughts was evident irrespective of group; however, significantly higher levels of future-oriented thoughts were provided by younger adults, contrasting with significantly higher instances of retrospection in the older group. In addition, older adults displayed significantly fewer incidences of self-referential cognition relative to their younger counterparts. Our findings indicate a distinct attenuation of off-task, self-generated thought processes with increasing age, with evidence for a shift in temporal focus and self-referential quality, during periods of low cognitive demand.

Affective neuroscience of self-generated thought

Despite increasing scientific interest in self-generated thought-mental content largely independent of the immediate environment-there has yet to be any comprehensive synthesis of the subjective experience and neural correlates of affect in these forms of thinking. Here, we aim to develop an integrated affective neuroscience encompassing many forms of self-generated thought-normal and pathological, moderate and excessive, in waking and in sleep. In synthesizing existing literature on this topic, we reveal consistent findings pertaining to the prevalence, valence, and variability of emotion in self-generated thought, and highlight how these factors might interact with self-generated thought to influence general well-being. We integrate these psychological findings with recent neuroimaging research, bringing attention to the neural correlates of affect in self-generated thought. We show that affect in self-generated thought is prevalent, positively biased, highly variable (both within and across individuals), and consistently recruits many brain areas implicated in emotional processing, including the orbitofrontal cortex, amygdala, insula, and medial prefrontal cortex. Many factors modulate these typical psychological and neural patterns, however; the emerging affective neuroscience of self-generated thought must endeavor to link brain function and subjective experience in both everyday self-generated thought as well as its dysfunctions in mental illness.

Empathic Care and Distress: Predictive Brain Markers and Dissociable Brain Systems

Encountering another's suffering can elicit both empathic distress and empathic care-the warm desire to affiliate. It remains unclear whether these two feelings can be accurately and differentially predicted from neural activity and to what extent their neural substrates can be distinguished. We developed fMRI markers predicting moment-by-moment intensity levels of care and distress intensity while participants (n = 66) listened to true biographies describing human suffering. Both markers' predictions correlated strongly with self-report in out-of-sample participants (r = 0.59 and r = 0.63, p < 0.00001), and both markers predicted later trial-by-trial charitable donation amounts (p < 0.05). Empathic care was preferentially associated with nucleus accumbens and medial orbitofrontal cortex activity, whereas distress was preferentially associated with premotor and somatosensory cortical activity. In tests of marker specificity with an independent behavioral sample (n = 200), the empathic care marker was associated with a mixed-valence feeling state, whereas the empathic distress marker was specific to negative emotion.

Social anxiety is characterized by biased learning about performance and the self

People learn about their self from social information, and recent work suggests that healthy adults show a positive bias for learning self-related information. In contrast, social anxiety disorder (SAD) is characterized by a negative view of the self, yet what causes and maintains this negative self-view is not well understood. Here the authors use a novel experimental paradigm and computational model to test the hypothesis that biased social learning regarding self-evaluation and self-feelings represents a core feature that distinguishes adults with SAD from healthy controls. Twenty-one adults with SAD and 35 healthy controls (HCs) performed a speech in front of 3 judges. They subsequently evaluated themselves and received performance feedback from the judges and then rated how they felt about themselves and the judges. Affective updating (i.e., change in feelings about the self over time, in response to feedback from the judges) was modeled using an adapted Rescorla-Wagner learning model. HCs demonstrated a positivity bias in affective updating, which was absent in SAD. Further, self-performance ratings revealed group differences in learning from positive feedback-a difference that endured at an average of 1 year follow up. These findings demonstrate the presence and long-term endurance of positively biased social learning about the self among healthy adults, a bias that is absent or reversed among socially anxious adults. (PsycINFO Database Record

Differences in frontal and limbic brain activation in a small sample of monozygotic twin pairs discordant for severe stressful life events

Monozygotic twin pairs provide a valuable opportunity to control for genetic and shared environmental influences while studying the effects of nonshared environmental influences. The question we address with this design is whether monozygotic twins selected for discordance in exposure to severe stressful life events during development (before age 18) demonstrate differences in brain activation during performance of an emotional word-face Stroop task. In this study, functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to assess brain activation in eighteen young adult twins who were discordant in exposure to severe stress such that one twin had two or more severe events compared to their control co-twin who had no severe events. Twins who experienced higher levels of stress during development, compared to their control co-twins with lower stress, exhibited significant clusters of greater activation in the ventrolateral and medial prefrontal cortex, basal ganglia, and limbic regions. The control co-twins showed only the more typical recruitment of frontoparietal regions thought to be important for executive control of attention and maintenance of task goals. Behavioral performance was not significantly different between twins within pairs, suggesting the twins with stress recruited additional neural resources associated with affective processing and updating working memory when performing at the same level. This study provides a powerful glimpse at the potential effects of stress during development while accounting for shared genetic and environmental influences.

Mind-wandering as spontaneous thought: a dynamic framework

Most research on mind-wandering has characterized it as a mental state with contents that are task unrelated or stimulus independent. However, the dynamics of mind-wandering - how mental states change over time - have remained largely neglected. Here, we introduce a dynamic framework for understanding mind-wandering and its relationship to the recruitment of large-scale brain networks. We propose that mind-wandering is best understood as a member of a family of spontaneous-thought phenomena that also includes creative thought and dreaming. This dynamic framework can shed new light on mental disorders that are marked by alterations in spontaneous thought, including depression, anxiety and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Large-Scale Network Dysfunction in Major Depressive Disorder: A Meta-analysis of Resting-State Functional Connectivity

IMPORTANCE

Major depressive disorder (MDD) has been linked to imbalanced communication among large-scale brain networks, as reflected by abnormal resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC). However, given variable methods and results across studies, identifying consistent patterns of network dysfunction in MDD has been elusive.

OBJECTIVE

To investigate network dysfunction in MDD through a meta-analysis of rsFC studies.

DATA SOURCES

Seed-based voxelwise rsFC studies comparing individuals with MDD with healthy controls (published before June 30, 2014) were retrieved from electronic databases (PubMed, Web of Science, and EMBASE) and authors contacted for additional data.

STUDY SELECTION

Twenty-seven seed-based voxel-wise rsFC data sets from 25 publications (556 individuals with MDD and 518 healthy controls) were included in the meta-analysis.

DATA EXTRACTION AND SYNTHESIS

Coordinates of seed regions of interest and between-group effects were extracted. Seeds were categorized into seed-networks by their location within a priori functional networks. Multilevel kernel density analysis of between-group effects identified brain systems in which MDD was associated with hyperconnectivity (increased positive or reduced negative connectivity) or hypoconnectivity (increased negative or reduced positive connectivity) with each seed-network.

RESULTS

Major depressive disorder was characterized by hypoconnectivity within the frontoparietal network, a set of regions involved in cognitive control of attention and emotion regulation, and hypoconnectivity between frontoparietal systems and parietal regions of the dorsal attention network involved in attending to the external environment. Major depressive disorder was also associated with hyperconnectivity within the default network, a network believed to support internally oriented and self-referential thought, and hyperconnectivity between frontoparietal control systems and regions of the default network. Finally, the MDD groups exhibited hypoconnectivity between neural systems involved in processing emotion or salience and midline cortical regions that may mediate top-down regulation of such functions.

CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE

Reduced connectivity within frontoparietal control systems and imbalanced connectivity between control systems and networks involved in internal or external attention may reflect depressive biases toward internal thoughts at the cost of engaging with the external world. Meanwhile, altered connectivity between neural systems involved in cognitive control and those that support salience or emotion processing may relate to deficits regulating mood. These findings provide an empirical foundation for a neurocognitive model in which network dysfunction underlies core cognitive and affective abnormalities in depression.

Resting-state networks predict individual differences in common and specific aspects of executive function

The goal of the present study was to examine relationships between individual differences in resting state functional connectivity as ascertained by fMRI (rs-fcMRI) and performance on tasks of executive function (EF), broadly defined as the ability to regulate thoughts and actions. Unlike most previous research that focused on the relationship between rs-fcMRI and a single behavioral measure of EF, in the current study we examined the relationship of rs-fcMRI with individual differences in subcomponents of EF. Ninety-one adults completed a resting state fMRI scan and three separate EF tasks outside the magnet: inhibition of prepotent responses, task set shifting, and working memory updating. From these three measures, we derived estimates of common aspects of EF, as well as abilities specific to working memory updating and task shifting. Using Independent Components Analysis (ICA), we identified across the group of participants several networks of regions (Resting State Networks, RSNs) with temporally correlated time courses. We then used dual regression to explore how these RSNs covaried with individual differences in EF. Dual regression revealed that increased higher common EF was associated with connectivity of a) frontal pole with an attentional RSN, and b) Crus I and II of the cerebellum with the right frontoparietal RSN. Moreover, higher shifting-specific abilities were associated with increased connectivity of angular gyrus with a ventral attention RSN. The results of the current study suggest that the organization of the brain at rest may have important implications for individual differences in EF, and that individuals higher in EF may have expanded resting state networks as compared to individuals with lower EF.

Separate neural representations for physical pain and social rejection

Current theories suggest that physical pain and social rejection share common neural mechanisms, largely by virtue of overlapping functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) activity. Here we challenge this notion by identifying distinct multivariate fMRI patterns unique to pain and rejection. Sixty participants experience painful heat and warmth and view photos of ex-partners and friends on separate trials. FMRI pattern classifiers discriminate pain and rejection from their respective control conditions in out-of-sample individuals with 92% and 80% accuracy. The rejection classifier performs at chance on pain, and vice versa. Pain- and rejection-related representations are uncorrelated within regions thought to encode pain affect (for example, dorsal anterior cingulate) and show distinct functional connectivity with other regions in a separate resting-state data set (N = 91). These findings demonstrate that separate representations underlie pain and rejection despite common fMRI activity at the gross anatomical level. Rather than co-opting pain circuitry, rejection involves distinct affective representations in humans.

Distracted and down: neural mechanisms of affective interference in subclinical depression

Previous studies have shown that depressed individuals have difficulty directing attention away from negative distractors, a phenomenon known as affective interference. However, findings are mixed regarding the neural mechanisms and network dynamics of affective interference. The present study addressed these issues by comparing neural activation during emotion-word and color-word Stroop tasks in participants with varying levels of (primarily subclinical) depression. Depressive symptoms predicted increased activation to negative distractors in areas of dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and posterior cingulate cortex (PCC), regions implicated in cognitive control and internally directed attention, respectively. Increased dACC activity was also observed in the group-average response to incongruent distractors, suggesting that dACC activity during affective interference is related to overtaxed cognitive control. In contrast, regions of PCC were deactivated across the group in response to incongruent distractors, suggesting that PCC activity during affective interference represents task-independent processing. A psychophysiological interaction emerged in which higher depression predicted more positively correlated activity between dACC and PCC during affective interference, i.e. greater connectivity between cognitive control and internal-attention systems. These findings suggest that, when individuals high in depression are confronted by negative material, increased attention to internal thoughts and difficulty shifting resources to the external world interfere with goal-directed behavior.

The default network and self-generated thought: component processes, dynamic control, and clinical relevance

Though only a decade has elapsed since the default network (DN) was first defined as a large-scale brain system, recent years have brought great insight into the network's adaptive functions. A growing theme highlights the DN as playing a key role in internally directed or self-generated thought. Here, we synthesize recent findings from cognitive science, neuroscience, and clinical psychology to focus attention on two emerging topics as current and future directions surrounding the DN. First, we present evidence that self-generated thought is a multifaceted construct whose component processes are supported by different subsystems within the network. Second, we highlight the dynamic nature of the DN, emphasizing its interaction with executive control systems when regulating aspects of internal thought. We conclude by discussing clinical implications of disruptions to the integrity of the network, and consider disorders when thought content becomes polarized or network interactions become disrupted or imbalanced.

Contributions of episodic retrieval and mentalizing to autobiographical thought: evidence from functional neuroimaging, resting-state connectivity, and fMRI meta-analyses

A growing number of studies suggest the brain's "default network" becomes engaged when individuals recall their personal past or simulate their future. Recent reports of heterogeneity within the network raise the possibility that these autobiographical processes comprised of multiple component processes, each supported by distinct functional-anatomic subsystems. We previously hypothesized that a medial temporal subsystem contributes to autobiographical memory and future thought by enabling individuals to retrieve prior information and bind this information into a mental scene. Conversely, a dorsal medial subsystem was proposed to support social-reflective aspects of autobiographical thought, allowing individuals to reflect on the mental states of one's self and others (i.e. "mentalizing"). To test these hypotheses, we first examined activity in the default network subsystems as participants performed two commonly employed tasks of episodic retrieval and mentalizing. In a subset of participants, relationships among task-evoked regions were examined at rest, in the absence of an overt task. Finally, large-scale fMRI meta-analyses were conducted to identify brain regions that most strongly predicted the presence of episodic retrieval and mentalizing, and these results were compared to meta-analyses of autobiographical tasks. Across studies, laboratory-based episodic retrieval tasks were preferentially linked to the medial temporal subsystem, while mentalizing tasks were preferentially linked to the dorsal medial subsystem. In turn, autobiographical tasks engaged aspects of both subsystems. These results suggest the default network is a heterogeneous brain system whose subsystems support distinct component processes of autobiographical thought.

Default mode network activity in male adolescents with conduct and substance use disorder

BACKGROUND

Adolescents with conduct disorder (CD) and substance use disorders (SUD) experience difficulty evaluating and regulating their behavior in anticipation of future consequences. Given the role of the brain's default mode network (DMN) in self-reflection and future thought, this study investigates whether DMN is altered in adolescents with CD and SUD, relative to controls.

METHODS

Twenty adolescent males with CD and SUD and 20 male controls of similar ages underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging as they completed a risk-taking decision task. We used independent component analysis as a data-driven approach to identify the DMN spatial component in individual subjects. DMN activity was then compared between groups.

RESULTS

Compared to controls, patients showed reduced activity in superior, medial and middle frontal gyrus (Brodmann area (BA) 10), retrosplenial cortex (BA 30) and lingual gyrus (BA 18), and bilateral middle temporal gryus (BA 21/22) - DMN regions thought to support self-referential evaluation, memory, foresight, and perspective taking. Furthermore, this pattern of reduced activity in patients remained robust after adjusting for the effects of depression and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Conversely, when not adjusting for effects of depression and ADHD, patients demonstrated greater DMN activity than controls solely in the cuneus (BA 19).

CONCLUSIONS

Collectively, these results suggest that comorbid CD and SUD in adolescents is characterized by atypical activity in brain regions thought to play an important role in introspective processing. These functional imbalances in brain networks may provide further insight into the neural underpinnings of conduct and substance use disorders.