Whole-brain functional connectivity during emotional word classification in medication-free Major Depressive Disorder: abnormal salience circuitry and relations to positive emotionality

van Tol, M.-J., Veer, I. M., van der Wee, N. J., van Buchem, M. A., Rombouts, S. A., Zitman, F. G., Veltman, D. J. and Johnstone, T. (2013) Whole-brain functional connectivity during emotional word classification in medication-free Major Depressive Disorder: abnormal salience circuitry and relations to positive emotionality. NeuroImage: Clinical, 2. pp. 790-796. ISSN 2213-1582 doi: 10.1016/j.nicl.2013.05.012

Abstract/Summary

Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) has been associated with biased processing and abnormal regulation of negative and positive information, which may result from compromised coordinated activity of prefrontal and subcortical brain regions involved in evaluating emotional information. We tested whether patients with MDD show distributed changes in functional connectivity with a set of independently derived brain networks that have shown high correspondence with different task demands, including stimulus salience and emotional processing. We further explored if connectivity during emotional word processing related to the tendency to engage in positive or negative emotional states. In this study, 25 medication-free MDD patients without current or past comorbidity and matched controls (n=25) performed an emotional word-evaluation task during functional MRI. Using a dual regression approach, individual spatial connectivity maps representing each subject’s connectivity with each standard network were used to evaluate between-group differences and effects of positive and negative emotionality (extraversion and neuroticism, respectively, as measured with the NEO-FFI). Results showed decreased functional connectivity of the medial prefrontal cortex, ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, and ventral striatum with the fronto-opercular salience network in MDD patients compared to controls. In patients, abnormal connectivity was related to extraversion, but not neuroticism. These results confirm the hypothesis of a relative (para)limbic-cortical decoupling that may explain dysregulated affect in MDD. As connectivity of these regions with the salience network was related to extraversion, but not to general depression severity or negative emotionality, dysfunction of this network may be responsible for the failure to sustain engagement in rewarding behavior.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/32712
Item Type	Article
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Interdisciplinary Research Centres (IDRCs) > Centre for Integrative Neuroscience and Neurodynamics (CINN) Life Sciences > School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences > Department of Psychology Life Sciences > School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences > Neuroscience Life Sciences > School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences > Psychopathology and Affective Neuroscience
Publisher	Elsevier
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