The search for biomarkers has been central to efforts of improving clinical diagnosis and prognosis in psychopathology in the last decades. The main approach has been to validate biomarkers that ...could accurately discriminate between clinical diagnoses of very prevalent forms of psychopathology. One of the most popular electrophysiological markers proposed for discrimination in depressive disorders is the electroencephalography (EEG)-derived frontal alpha asymmetry. However, the validity, reliability and predictive value of this biomarker have been questioned in recent years, mainly due to conceptual and methodological heterogeneity.
In the current non-experimental, correlational study we investigated relationship of resting-state EEG alpha asymmetry from multiple sites (frontal, frontolateral, and parietal) with different forms of depressive disorders (varying in type or severity), in a clinical sample.
Results showed that alpha asymmetry in the parietal (P3-P4) was significantly higher than in the frontal (F3-F4) and frontolateral sites (F7-F8). However, we did not find significant relations between alpha asymmetry indices and our depressive disorder measures, except for a moderate positive association between frontolateral alpha asymmetry (eyes-closed only) and depressive disorder severity (determined through clinical structured interview). We also found no significant differences in alpha asymmetry between participants, depending on their depression type.
Based on results, we propose the parietal and frontolateral asymmetry indices to form hypotheses that should not be abandoned in the depression markers research, but worth for further experimental research. Methodological and clinical implications of the current findings are discussed.
The involvement of serotonin in emotion and psychopathology has been extensively examined. Studies using acute tryptophan depletion (ATD) have found limited effects on mood and aggression, and one of ...the explanations suggests that serotonin may be involved in higher-order functions, such as emotion regulation. However, there is very limited evidence for this hypothesis. The present study investigated the impact of ATD on emotion regulation in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, crossover design. A sample of psychiatrically healthy men (N = 28) completed a cognitive task assessing reappraisal ability (i.e., the success of using reappraisal, an emotion regulation strategy, to modulate emotional responses), following ATD and placebo. EEG frontal activity and asymmetry, as well as heart-rate variability (HRV), also were assessed in the reappraisal task. Both frequentist and Bayesian methods were employed for statistical analysis. Results indicated that ATD reduced plasma tryptophan, and reappraisal was effective in modulating emotional experience in the emotion regulation task. However, ATD had no significant effect on reappraisal ability, frontal activity, and HRV. These results offer direct and compelling evidence that decreasing serotonin synthesis through ATD does not alter an emotion regulation ability that is considered crucial in mood and aggression and has been linked with transdiagnostic risk of psychopathology.
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EMUNI, FIS, FZAB, GEOZS, GIS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
The concept of discernment refers to a factual psychological state, to which the legislator has attached a series of legal consequences. In Civil Law, finding out whether a person has discernment is ...a sine qua non premise for establishing whether they have civil competence, consent or delictual responsibility. However, in practice, it is far more difficult to establish whether a person has discernment. We offer a critical analysis of the concept of discernment through the issue of mental disability, as legal cause for lack of discernment, arguing that discernment is a fluid concept (i.e., there are degrees of discernment). Mental disability represents a heterogenous category of causes affecting discernment; the more problematic situations are the ones in which mental abilities are only partially affected (i.e., temporary states, certain mental disorders). As consequence, people who have reduced discernment may escape the legal protection that is enforced in people who completely lack discernment. We discuss practical implications and potential solutions.
A recent study also has drawn attention to the high individual variability in the response to SSRIs (da Cunha-Bang et al., 2019). Several studies (Choi et al., 2016; Deng et al., 2021) have examined ...electroencephalographic (EEG) frontal alpha power asymmetry in reappraisal ability tasks. Crucially, we combined traditional frequentist and Bayesian statistical analyses to provide a full account of the data in terms of relative evidence supporting the alternative or the null hypothesis. The following exclusion criteria applied: (1) past or current medical conditions including neurological or endocrine disorders; (2) mental health problems, such as major depressive disorder, anxiety disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, eating disorders; (3) current use of antibiotics; (4) current use of psychoactive medication; (5) frequent alcohol abuse; and (5) regular smoking.
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EMUNI, FIS, FZAB, GEOZS, GIS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, MFDPS, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, SBMB, SBNM, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, VKSCE, ZAGLJ
The study of moral judgements often centres on moral dilemmas in which options consistent with deontological perspectives (that is, emphasizing rules, individual rights and duties) are in conflict ...with options consistent with utilitarian judgements (that is, following the greater good based on consequences). Greene et al. (2009) showed that psychological and situational factors (for example, the intent of the agent or the presence of physical contact between the agent and the victim) can play an important role in moral dilemma judgements (for example, the trolley problem). Our knowledge is limited concerning both the universality of these effects outside the United States and the impact of culture on the situational and psychological factors affecting moral judgements. Thus, we empirically tested the universality of the effects of intent and personal force on moral dilemma judgements by replicating the experiments of Greene et al. in 45 countries from all inhabited continents. We found that personal force and its interaction with intention exert influence on moral judgements in the US and Western cultural clusters, replicating and expanding the original findings. Moreover, the personal force effect was present in all cultural clusters, suggesting it is culturally universal. The evidence for the cultural universality of the interaction effect was inconclusive in the Eastern and Southern cultural clusters (depending on exclusion criteria). We found no strong association between collectivism/individualism and moral dilemma judgements.
