Negative biases in emotional processing are well recognised in people who are currently depressed but are less well described in those with a history of depression, where such biases may contribute ...to vulnerability to relapse.
To compare accuracy, discrimination and bias in face emotion recognition in those with current and remitted depression.
The sample comprised a control group (n = 101), a currently depressed group (n = 30) and a remitted depression group (n = 99). Participants provided valid data after receiving a computerised face emotion recognition task following standardised assessment of diagnosis and mood symptoms.
In the control group women were more accurate in recognising emotions than men owing to greater discrimination. Among participants with depression, those in remission correctly identified more emotions than controls owing to increased response bias, whereas those currently depressed recognised fewer emotions owing to decreased discrimination. These effects were most marked for anger, fear and sadness but there was no significant emotion × group interaction, and a similar pattern tended to be seen for happiness although not for surprise or disgust. These differences were confined to participants who were antidepressant-free, with those taking antidepressants having similar results to the control group.
Abnormalities in face emotion recognition differ between people with current depression and those in remission. Reduced discrimination in depressed participants may reflect withdrawal from the emotions of others, whereas the increased bias in those with a history of depression could contribute to vulnerability to relapse. The normal face emotion recognition seen in those taking medication may relate to the known effects of antidepressants on emotional processing and could contribute to their ability to protect against depressive relapse.
Increasing evidence suggests that discrete neural networks that mediate emotion processing are activated when mothers respond to infant's images or cries. Accumulating data also indicate that natural ...variation in maternal caregiving behavior is related to maternal oxytocin (OT) levels. However, brain activation to infant cues has not been studied comparing mothers at disparate ends of the "maternal sensitivity" spectrum. Based on observed mother-infant play interaction at 4-6 months postpartum in 80 antenatally recruited mothers, 15 mothers with the highest sensitivity (HSMs) and 15 mothers with the lowest sensitivity (LSMs) were followed at 7-9 months using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine brain responses to viewing videos of their "own" versus an "unknown" infant in 3 affect states (neutral, happy, and sad). Plasma OT measurements were taken from mothers following play interactions with their infant. Compared with LSMs, HSMs showed significantly greater brain activation in right superior temporal gyrus (STG) in response to own versus unknown neutral infant and to own happy versus neutral control. Changes in brain activation were significantly negatively correlated with plasma OT responses in HSMs mothers. Conversely, compared with HSMs, LSMs showed no significant activation difference in response to own infant separately or in contrast to unknown infant. Activation of STG may index sensitive maternal response to own infant stimuli. Sensitive parenting may have its unique profile in relation to brain responses which can act as biomarkers for future intervention studies that enhance sensitivity of maternal care.
The relationship between altered default mode network (DMN) connectivity and abnormal serotonin function in major depressive disorder (MDD) has not been investigated. Using intravenous citalopram and ...resting-state fMRI, we investigated DMN intra-network connectivity and serotonin function in 77 healthy controls and patients with MDD. There were no significant main effects of MDD or citalopram on DMN intra-network connectivity; however, significant interactions indicated that group differences under saline were modified by citalopram. In MDD patients during saline infusion, in contrast with controls, the DMN (i) did not include the precuneus that was instead part of an anti-correlated network but (ii) did include amygdala that was part of the anti-correlated network in controls. Citalopram infusion in MDD patients restored the pattern seen in controls under saline. In healthy controls, citalopram infusion disengaged the precuneus from the DMN and engaged the amygdala, partially reproducing the abnormalities seen under saline in MDD. In exploratory analyses within the MDD group, greater rumination self-ratings were associated with greater intra-network connectivity of the anterior cingulate cortex with the DMN. We hypothesise that, in MDD, disengagement of the precuneus from the DMN relates to overgeneral memory bias in rumination. The opposite effect, with greater engagement of the amygdala in the DMN, reflects the negative valence of rumination. Reversal of these abnormalities by citalopram suggests that they may be related to impaired serotonin function. That citalopram engaged the amygdala in the DMN in controls may relate to the paradoxical effects on aversive processing seen with acute SSRIs in healthy subjects.
Abstract Background Maternal sensitivity to infant cues and developmental needs may be pivotal for social and cognitive development. Animal and recent human studies emphasise a major role for ...Oxytocin (OT) in mediating sensitive caregiving but no study has examined the relationship between OT and extreme variation in human maternal sensitivity. Methods : From 105 expectant mothers, 80 underwent blind-rating of maternal sensitivity at 4–6 months postpartum through free-play interaction with their infants. At 7–9 months postpartum, 30 mothers at extremes of maternal sensitivity: 15 ‘sensitive mothers’ (high sensitivity mothers – HSMs, mean=4.47; SD=0.74) and 15 ‘less sensitive mothers’ (low sensitivity mothers – LSMs, mean=2.13; SD=0.52) underwent plasma OT measurements before and after 10 min infant play. Results : Baseline and post-interaction plasma OT was higher in LSMs than HSMs F (1, 26)=8.42; p =0.01. HSMs showed a trend towards significant reduction in plasma OT t (14)=2.01; p =0.06 following play-interaction; no change was shown by LSMs t (13)=−0.14; p =0.89. Conclusion Higher baseline OT levels in healthy LSMs may imply greater stress responses to the demands of caring for an infant, or past deficiencies in own parenting relationship and act as a biomarker for poor parental sensitivity. OT may be acting to reduce stress and anxiety in LSMs consistent with studies of plasma OT and stress in women. By contrast, in HSMs, play interaction with their infants maybe relaxing as indicated by significant reduction in plasma OT from baseline. Ascertainment of mothers in well-defined sensitivity groups might facilitate examination of distinct coping strategies in parents and better understanding of variation in parental caregiving behaviour and its potential for modulation by OT. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled Oxytocin and Social Behav.
Background The neuroplastic pathway, which includes cyclic adenosine monophosphate response element-binding protein 1 ( CREB1 ), brain-derived neurotrophic factor ( BDNF ), and its receptor ...(neurotrophic tyrosine kinase receptor, type 2 NTRK2 ), plays a crucial role in the adaptation of brain to stress, and thus variations of these genes are plausible risk factors for depression. Methods A population-based sample was recruited, subsets of which were interviewed and underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging. We investigated the association of nine polymorphisms throughout the CREB1-BDNF-NTRK2 pathway with lifetime depression, rumination, current depression severity, negative life events, and sad face emotion processing in a three-level design. Results In the population study, BDNF -rs6265 and CREB1 -rs2253206 major alleles were significantly associated with rumination and through rumination with current depression severity. However, childhood adversity increased the risk of lifetime depression in the minor allele carriers of BDNF -rs6265 and CREB1 -rs2253206 and in alleles of six other single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). We validated our findings in the interviewed subjects using structural equation modeling. Finally, using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we found that viewing sad faces evoked greater activity in depression-related areas in healthy control subjects possessing the minor alleles of BDNF -rs6265 and CREB1 -rs2253206. Conclusions Genetic variation associated with reduced function in the CREB1-BDNF-NTRK2 pathway has multiple, sometimes opposing, influences on risk mechanisms of depression, but almost all the SNPs studied amplified the effect of childhood adversity. The use of cognitive and neural intermediate phenotypes together with a molecular pathway approach may be critical to understanding how genes influence risk of depression.
Background:
Reduced frontal cortex metabolism and blood flow in depression may be associated with low mood and cognitive impairment. Further reduction has been reported during a course of ...electroconvulsive therapy but it is not known if this relates to mood and cognitive changes caused by electroconvulsive therapy.
Aims:
The purpose of this study was to investigate frontal function while undertaking cognitive tasks in depressed patients compared with healthy controls, and following electroconvulsive therapy in patients.
Methods:
We measured frontal haemodynamic responses to a category verbal fluency task and a working memory N-back task using portable functional near infra-red spectroscopy (fNIRS) in 51 healthy controls and 18 severely depressed patients, 12 of whom were retested after the fourth treatment of a course of electroconvulsive therapy. Mood was assessed using the Montgomery Åsberg Depression Rating Scale and cognitive function using category Verbal Fluency from the Controlled Oral Word Association Test and Digit Span backwards.
Results:
Compared to healthy controls, depressed patients had bilaterally lower frontal oxyhaemoglobin responses to the cognitive tasks, although this was only significant for the N-Back task where performance correlated inversely with depression severity in patients. After four electroconvulsive therapy treatments oxyhaemoglobin responses were further reduced during the Verbal Fluency task but the changes did not correlate with mood or cognitive changes.
Discussion:
Our results confirmed a now extensive literature showing impaired frontal fNIRS oxyhaemoglobin responses to cognitive tasks in depression, and showed for the first time that these are further reduced during a course of electroconvulsive therapy. Further research is needed to investigate the biology and clinical utility of frontal fNIRS in psychiatric patients.
The neural basis of maternal bonding Wan, Ming Wai; Downey, Darragh; Strachan, Hilary ...
PloS one,
03/2014, Letnik:
9, Številka:
3
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Accumulating evidence suggests that mothers show a different pattern of brain responses when viewing their own compared to other infants. However, there is inconsistency across functional imaging ...studies regarding the key areas involved, and none have examined relationships between brain and behavioural responses to infants. We examined the brain regions activated when mothers viewed videos of their own infant contrasted with an unknown infant, and whether these are associated with behavioural and self-reported measures of mother-infant relations.
Twenty right-handed mothers viewed alternating 30-sec blocks of video of own 4-9 month infant and an unfamiliar matched infant, interspersed with neutral video. Whole brain functional magnetic resonance images (fMRI) were acquired on a 1.5T Philips Intera scanner using a TR of 2.55 s. Videotaped mother-infant interactions were systematically evaluated blind to family information to generate behavioural measures for correlational analysis.
Enhanced blood oxygenation functional imaging responses were found in the own versus unknown infant contrast in the bilateral precuneus, right superior temporal gyrus, right medial and left middle frontal gyri and left amygdala. Positive mother-infant interaction (less directive parent behaviour; more positive/attentive infant behaviour) was significantly associated with greater activation in several regions on viewing own versus unknown infant, particularly the middle frontal gyrus. Mothers' perceived warmth of her infant was correlated with activations in the same contrast, particularly in sensory and visual areas.
This study partially replicates previous reports of the brain regions activated in mothers in response to the visual presentation of their own infant. It is the first to report associations between mothers' unique neural responses to viewing their own infant with the quality of her concurrent behaviour when interacting with her infant and with her perceptions of infant warmth. These findings provide support for developing fMRI as a potential biomarker of parenting risk and change.
IntroductionImproving the lives of children and adolescents with parental mental illness (CAPRI) remains an urgent political and public health concern for the UK and European Union. Recurrent ...parental mental illness is believed to lead to fractures in the family, academic and social lives of these children, yet interventions are poorly targeted and non-specific. Part of an interdisciplinary programme of work (the CAPRI Programme; grant number: 682741), CAPRI-Voc aims to achieve two goals: first, to test the feasibility of our longitudinal imaging paradigm in mother–infant pairs where the mother has a diagnosis of severe mental illness. Second, to compare development of vocal processing in these infants with infants in the general population.Methods and analysisRecruitment of 100 infants of mothers with mental illness, alongside 50 infants of healthy mothers. Both cohorts of infants will undergo functional near infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) brain imaging at three time points: 9, 12 and 18 months to explore differences between cohorts in their neural responses to vocal stimuli in our language paradigm. Mothers will complete an interview and psychological questionnaires. We shall also complete an infant developmental battery and mother–child interaction play session. Data on recruitment, retention and dropout will be recorded.Ethics and disseminationIt will be made clear that fNIRS is a safe, non-invasive technology widely used in infant clinical and psychological research. We shall reassure mothers that no definitive causal link exists between maternal mental illness and language development in infants, and that individual data will only exist as part of the wider dataset. As the study includes both children and vulnerable adults, all research staff will complete National Health Service (NHS) Safeguarding level 3 training. Dissemination will be via direct feedback to stakeholders, patient and advisory groups, and through presentations at conferences, journal publications and university/NHS trust communications. The study was approved through North West–Greater Manchester West Research Ethics Committee (17/NW/0074) and Health Research Authority (212715).
Paired associative stimulation (PAS), is a novel non-invasive technique where two neural substrates are employed in a temporally coordinated manner in order to modulate cortico-motor excitability ...within the motor cortex (M1). In swallowing, combined pharyngeal electrical and transcranial-magnetic-stimulation induced beneficial neurophysiological and behavioural effects in healthy subjects and dysphagic stroke patients. Here, we aimed to investigate the whole-brain changes in neural activation during swallowing using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) following PAS application and in parallel assess associated GABA changes with magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS).
Healthy adults (n=11, 38±9years old) were randomised to receive real and sham PAS to the ‘stronger’ motor cortex pharyngeal representation, on 2 separate visits. Following PAS, event-related fMRI was performed to assess changes in brain activation in response to water and saliva swallowing and during rest. Data were analysed (SPM8) at P<.001. MRS data were acquired using MEGA-PRESS before and after the fMRI acquisitions on both visits and GABA concentrations were measured (AMARES, jMRUI).
Following real PAS, BOLD signal changes (group analyses) increased at the site of stimulation during water and saliva swallowing, compared to sham PAS. It is also evident that PAS induced significant increases in BOLD signal to contralateral (to stimulation) hemispheric areas that are of importance to the swallowing neural network. Following real PAS, GABA:creatine ratio showed a trend to increase contralateral to PAS.
Targeted PAS applied to the human pharyngeal motor cortex induces local and remote changes in both primary and non-primary areas for water and saliva tasks. There is a possibility that changes of the inhibitory neurotransmitter, GABA, may play a role in the changes in BOLD signal. These findings provide evidence for the mechanisms underlying the beneficial effects of PAS on the brain swallowing network.
•Paired associative stimulation (PAS) over pharyngeal M1 was studied with fMRI and MRS.•Water and saliva swallowing BOLD signal increased following real PAS vs. sham PAS.•BOLD changes showed a shift to bilateral premotor areas and insula.•MRS in bilateral M1 showed that the GABA:creatine ratio changed with real PAS.
Background Vulnerability to relapse persists after remission of an acute episode of major depressive disorder. This has been attributed to abnormal biases in the processing of emotional stimuli in ...limbic circuits. However, neuroimaging studies have not so far revealed consistent evidence of abnormal responses to emotional stimuli in limbic structures, such as the amygdala, in remitted depression. This suggests the problem might lie in the integrated functioning of emotion processing circuits. Methods We recruited 22 unmedicated patients in remission from major depressive disorder (rMDD) and 21 age-matched healthy control subjects. Functional magnetic resonance imaging was performed during a face emotion processing task. Dynamic causal modeling was used with Bayesian model selection to determine the most likely brain networks and valence-specific modulation of connectivity in healthy control subjects and rMDD. Results In healthy volunteers, sad faces modulated bi-directional connections between amygdala and orbitofrontal cortex and between fusiform gyrus and orbitofrontal cortex. Happy faces modulated unidirectional connections from fusiform gyrus to orbitofrontal cortex. In rMDD, the opposite pattern was observed, with evidence of happy faces modulating bidirectional frontotemporal connections and sad faces modulating unidirectional fusiform–orbitofrontal connections. Conclusions Participants with rMDD have abnormal modulation of frontotemporal effective connectivity in response to happy and sad face emotions, despite normal activations within each region. Specifically, processing of mood incongruent happy information was associated with a more richly modulated frontotemporal brain network, whereas mood congruent sad information was associated with less network modulation. This supports a hypothesis of dysfunction within cortico–limbic connections in individuals vulnerable to depression.
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