This paper acknowledges the need for a user-centric solution that helps with emotional regulation and stress management in children with ADHD. The paper presents a unique and comprehensive solution ...that integrates Reinforcement Learning (RL) algorithms to enhance user experience and aid children with ADHD to regulate their emotions and behaviours through a reward-based system. Through careful analysis of existing literature, and user requirements assessment, a comprehensive framework that integrates machine learning algorithms, physical and digital solution components through a user-centric design approach has been proposed. The core objective is to design and develop a sensory regulation system specifically tailored to the requirements of children with ADHD. Through the development of an engaging and impactful sensory regulation system, children can experience social and academic aspects of school positively while also having the opportunity to expand their social circle through inclusive play environments and ultimately improving their daily experiences. This paper aims to address the imminent need for emotional regulation and stress management tools catering to children with ADHD. By incorporating Reinforcement Learning (RL) algorithms with a reward-based interaction, this paper aims to solve critical challenges faced by children with ADHD, like emotional regulation difficulties, stress management, poor social skills, and academic performance issues so that they can lead more holistic lives.
Since the publication of the first neuroscience study investigating emotion with music about two decades ago, the number of functional neuroimaging studies published on this topic has increased each ...year. This research interest is in part due to the ubiquity of music across cultures, and to music's power to evoke a diverse range of intensely felt emotions. To support a better understanding of the brain correlates of music-evoked emotions this article reports a coordinate-based meta-analysis of neuroimaging studies (n = 47 studies with n = 944 subjects). The studies employed a range of diverse experimental approaches (e.g., using music to evoke joy, sadness, fear, tension, frissons, surprise, unpleasantness, or feelings of beauty). The results of an activation likelihood estimation (ALE) indicate large clusters in a range of structures, including amygdala, anterior hippocampus, auditory cortex, and numerous structures of the reward network (ventral and dorsal striatum, anterior cingulate cortex, orbitofrontal cortex, secondary somatosensory cortex). The results underline the rewarding nature of music, the role of the auditory cortex as an emotional hub, and the role of the hippocampus in attachment-related emotions and social bonding.
Behavioral studies have suggested that exaggerated reactivity to food cues, especially those associated with high-calorie foods, may be a factor underlying obesity. This increased motivational ...potency of foods in obese individuals appears to be mediated in part by a hyperactive reward system. We used a Philips 3T magnet and fMRI to investigate activation of reward-system and associated brain structures in response to pictures of high-calorie and low-calorie foods in 12 obese compared to 12 normal-weight women. A regions of interest (ROI) analysis revealed that pictures of high-calorie foods produced significantly greater activation in the obese group compared to controls in medial and lateral orbitofrontal cortex, amygdala, nucleus accumbens/ventral striatum, medial prefrontal cortex, insula, anterior cingulate cortex, ventral pallidum, caudate, putamen, and hippocampus. For the contrast of high-calorie vs. low-calorie foods, the obese group also exhibited a larger difference than the controls did in all of the same regions of interest except for the putamen. Within-group contrasts revealed that pictures of high-calorie foods uniformly stimulated more activation than low-calorie foods did in the obese group. By contrast, in the control group, greater activation by high-calorie foods was seen only in dorsal caudate, whereas low-calorie foods were more effective than high-calorie foods in the lateral orbitofrontal cortex, medial prefrontal cortex, and anterior cingulate cortex. In summary, compared to normal-weight controls, obese women exhibited greater activation in response to pictures of high-calorie foods in a large number of regions hypothesized to mediate motivational effects of food cues.
•MDD is associated with alterations in dopamine transmission within the reward system.•NIBS hold promise for improving MDD but remission rates are still modest.•Baseline levels of dopamine activity ...could shape the antidepressant effects of NIBS.•Sensory-based interventions activate the meso-cortico-limbic dopamine system.•Combining NIBS with sensory-based interventions may reduce MDD symptoms.
Major depressive disorder (MDD) is characterized by symptoms such as low mood and anhedonia related to altered dopamine transmission in the reward system. In addition, approximately one-third of patients with MDD develop treatment-resistance to the pharmaceutical treatment, necessitating alternative therapeutic strategies. While non-invasive brain stimulation (NIBS) holds promise for improving treatment-resistant MDD, remission rates are still relatively modest. It has been demonstrated that NIBS effects not only depend of the stimulation properties but are also “state-dependent”, meaning that when patients engage in specific tasks or states that involve similar neural networks targeted by NIBS, a synergistic and additive therapeutic effect may occur. Therefore, a recent strategy to improve treatment outcomes is to combine NIBS with other types of interventions targeting the same network.
Numerous studies have demonstrated a clinically meaningful antidepressant effects when NIBS are combined with psychotherapy, cognitive-behavioral approaches, or cognitive remediation programs for patients with MDD. However, widespread use of this combination may be hindered by barriers such as cost and accessibility for both clinicians and patients. Alternatively, sensory-based interventions alone (such as music therapy or exposure to specific odors) represent a promising, easy-to-implement, cost-effective and innovative therapeutic approach for MDD. These interventions are known to activate the meso-cortico-limbic system, triggering dopamine release, or modulating dopaminergic tone in various brain structures, similar to what is observed with NIBS. In this paper, the hypothesis that combining sensory-based interventions with NIBS is a compelling approach to alleviating MDD symptoms is tested. Specifically, it is hypothesized that the dual activation of the reward system induced by sensory-based interventions, combined with the concurrent application of NIBS, will result in a synergistic effect, ultimately leading to enhanced alleviation of MDD symptoms.
Does our understanding of the human brain remain incomplete without a proper understanding of how the brain processes music? Here, the author makes a passionate plea for the use of music in the ...investigation of human emotion and its brain correlates, arguing that music can change activity in all brain structures associated with emotions, which has important implications on how we understand human emotions and their disorders and how we can make better use of beneficial effects of music in therapy.
Does our understanding of the human brain remain incomplete without a proper understanding of how the brain processes music? Here, the author makes a passionate plea for the use of music in the investigation of human emotion and its brain correlates, arguing that music can change activity in all brain structures associated with emotions, which has important implications on how we understand human emotions and their disorders and how we can make better use of beneficial effects of music in therapy.
Assessment and Treatment of Eating Disorders YOSHIUCHI, Kazuhiro; YAMADA, Hisashi; TAKAKURA, Shu ...
Journal of Nutritional Science and Vitaminology,
2022/11/30, 2022-11-30, Volume:
68, Issue:
Supplement
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
Eating disorders are serious psychiatric conditions in terms of chronicity and have the highest mortality rate among psychiatric disorders. The assessment and treatment of eating disorders are also ...challenging, due to patients’ denial of their illness and reluctance for change. Despite a large number of previous assessment and treatment studies, new strategies to overcome these difficulties are still needed. This study casts light on four aspects; involvement of the brain’s reward system, stages of change in relationship with motivation, refeeding syndrome during renourishment, and gut microbiota changes relating to chronicity. Further studies relating to these aspects are encouraged.
Recent research shows that the effects of oxytocin are more diverse than initially thought and that in some cases oxytocin can directly influence the response to drugs and alcohol. Large individual ...differences in basal oxytocin levels and reactivity of the oxytocin system exist. This paper will review the literature to explore how individual differences in the oxytocin system arise and examine the hypothesis that this may mediate some of the individual differences in susceptibility to addiction and relapse.
Differences in the oxytocin system can be based on individual factors, e.g. genetic variation especially in the oxytocin receptor, age or gender, or be the result of early environmental influences such as social experiences, stress or trauma. The paper addresses the factors that cause individual differences in the oxytocin system and the environmental factors that have been identified to induce long-term changes in the developing oxytocin system during different life phases.
Individual differences in the oxytocin system can influence effects of drugs and alcohol directly or indirectly. The oxytocin system has bidirectional interactions with the stress-axis, autonomic nervous system, neurotransmitter systems (e.g. dopamine, serotonin and GABA/glutamate) and the immune system. These systems are all important, even vital, in different phases of addiction.
It is suggested that early life adversity can change the development of the oxytocin system and the way it modulates other systems. This in turn could minimise the negative feedback loops that would normally exist. Individuals may show only minor differences in behaviour and function unless subsequent stressors or drug use challenges the system. It is postulated that at that time individual differences in oxytocin levels, reactivity of the system or interactions with other systems can influence general resilience, drug effects and the susceptibility to develop problematic drug and alcohol use.
Suggested model: individual factors and (early) environment shape the development of the oxytocin system affecting susceptibility to addiction and resilience.
Substantial individual differences exist in basal oxytocin levels and reactivity of the system. The endogenous oxytocin system changes and matures over time as part of normal development. This paper postulates that individual factors and early external influences (i.e. parenting, stress and illness) affect the developing endogenous oxytocin system and its connectivity with other systems affecting oxytocin levels and alter responsiveness of the oxytocin system. When an individual is exposed to alcohol and drugs in adolescence, these individual differences in the endogenous oxytocin system can affect reward seeking and drug use behaviour. It is postulated that for example drug use may be more rewarding resulting in an escalation of use; an imbalance between natural and drug rewards could affect the attractiveness of excessive drug use; individuals may be more susceptible to stress-induced relapse to drug use. Display omitted
•Individual differences exist in the endogenous oxytocin system.•These differences can arise from individual and environmental factors.•Oxytocin can (in)directly influence biological systems involved in addiction.•Differences in endogenous oxytocin system may affect susceptibility to addiction.
•We synthesize ADHD neuroimaging findings on the reward system with findings in obesity, depression, and substance use disorder.•We analyze findings from monetary incentive delay (MID) and delay ...discounting (DD) tasks, and striatal connectivity and volumetry.•We discuss these neuroimaging features in ADHD, obesity, depression and substance use disorder and ask whether ADHD heterogeneity and comorbidity are reflected by a common dysregulation in the reward system.•We highlight conceptual issues related to heterogeneous paradigms, different phenotyping, and longitudinal prediction.
ADHD is a disorder characterized by changes in the reward system and which is highly comorbid with other mental disorders, suggesting common neurobiological pathways. Transdiagnostic neuroimaging findings could help to understand whether a dysregulated reward pathway might be the actual link between ADHD and its comorbidities. We here synthesize ADHD neuroimaging findings on the reward system with findings in obesity, depression, and substance use disorder including their comorbid appearance regarding neuroanatomical features (structural MRI) and activation patterns (resting-state and functional MRI). We focus on findings from monetary-incentive-delay (MID) and delay-discounting (DD) tasks and then review data on striatal connectivity and volumetry. Next, for better understanding of comorbidity in adult ADHD, we discuss these neuroimaging features in ADHD, obesity, depression and substance use disorder and ask whether ADHD heterogeneity and comorbidity are reflected by a common dysregulation in the reward system. Finally, we highlight conceptual issues related to heterogeneous paradigms, different phenotyping, longitudinal prediction and highlight some promising future directions for using striatal reward functioning as a clinical biomarker.
Sexually explicit material (SEM) is increasingly used in western societies. One reason for this high usage might be the rewarding property of SEM demonstrated in many brain imaging studies showing an ...activation of the reward system during the presentation of SEM. It is not yet well understood why women use SEM to a remarkably lesser extent than men. Maybe men react stronger to stimuli – so called SEM cues –, which signal the presentation of SEM and are therefore more vulnerable to use SEM than women. Therefore, the present study aimed at investigating the sex specific neural correlates towards SEM and SEM cues. We were further interested in whether person characteristics as trait sexual motivation, extent of SEM use in the last month, and age at onset of goal-oriented SEM use affect the neural responses to SEM and SEM cues. The trials of the fMRI experiment consisted of an expectation phase with SEM or neutral cues and a presentation phase with SEM or neutral stimuli, respectively. Analyses showed that the reward circuitry was activated by SEM, but also by SEM cues. There were some sex differences in hemodynamic responses to SEM during the presentation phase, but not during the expectation phase to SEM cues in any of the regions of interest. The influence of the investigated person characteristics was only small if existent. The results suggest that sex specific cue processing cannot explain sex differences in the use of SEM.
•SEM cues resulted in similar neural activations as the presentation of SEM.•The neural responses towards cues did not differ between men and women.•There were some sex differences in the neural responses towards SEM.•The nucleus accumbens response was unaffected by person characteristics.
Social rewards (e.g., social feedback, praise, and social interactions) are fundamental to social learning and relationships across the life span. Exposure to social rewards is linked to activation ...in key brain regions, that are impaired in major depression. This is the first summary of neuroimaging literature on social reward processing in depressed and healthy individuals.
We screened 409 studies and identified 25 investigating task-based fMRI activation during exposure to social stimuli in depressed and healthy populations across the lifespan. We conducted a systematic review followed by an Activation Likelihood Estimation (ALE) analysis of three main contrasts: a) positive social feedback vs. neutral stimuli; b) negative social feedback vs. neutral stimuli; c) positive vs. negative social feedback. We also compared activation patterns in depressed versus healthy controls.
Systematic review revealed that social rewards elicit increased activation in subcortical reward regions (NAcc, amygdala, ventral striatum, thalamus) in healthy and depressed individuals; and decreased activation in prefrontal reward regions (medial prefrontal cortex, orbitofrontal cortex) among depressed persons. Our meta-analysis showed, in both depressed and healthy individuals, increased cluster activation of the putamen and caudate in response to negative social stimuli vs. positive stimuli. We also found increased cluster activation in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and the medial frontal gyrus (MFG) in healthy controls vs. depressed individuals, in response to negative social stimuli.
Processing of social stimuli elicits activation of key brain regions involved in affective and social information processing. Interventions for depression can increase social reward responsivity to improve outcomes.
•Social rewards are highly motivating and associated with mood fluctuations in depressed and healthy individuals.•We conducted a systematic review and a coordinate-based meta-analysis of studies using fMRI social rewards tasks.•Our meta-analysis showed higher striatal activation for social rewards in both depressed and healthy individuals.•Healthy controls had increased activation in the default mode and salience networks in response to negative social stimuli.•Social reward exposure is linked to activation in key brain regions that may be promising treatment targets for depression.
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