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Coping with emotions past: the neural bases of regulating affect associated with negative autobiographical memories.

ABSTRACT: Although the ability to adaptively reflect on negative autobiographical experiences without ruminating is critical to mental health, to our knowledge no research has directly examined the neural systems underlying this process.Sixteen participants were scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) as they focused on negative autobiographical memories using cognitive strategies designed to facilitate (feel strategy) versus undermine (analyze and accept strategies) rumination.Two key findings were obtained. First, consistent with prior emotion regulation research using image-based stimuli, left prefrontal activity was observed during the implementation of all three strategies. Second, activity in a network of regions involved in self-referential processing and emotion, including subgenual anterior cingulate cortex and medial prefrontal cortex, was highest in response to the feel strategy and lowest for the accept strategy. This pattern of activation mirrored participants' self-reports of negative affect when engaging in each strategy.These findings shed light on the brain regions that distinguish adaptive versus maladaptive forms of reflecting on negative autobiographical memories and offer a novel, ecologically valid route to exploring the neural bases of emotion regulation using fMRI.

SUBMITTER: Kross E

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2726992 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Coping with emotions past: the neural bases of regulating affect associated with negative autobiographical memories.

Kross Ethan E Davidson Matthew M Weber Jochen J Ochsner Kevin K

Biological psychiatry 20081205 5

<h4>Background</h4>Although the ability to adaptively reflect on negative autobiographical experiences without ruminating is critical to mental health, to our knowledge no research has directly examined the neural systems underlying this process.<h4>Methods</h4>Sixteen participants were scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) as they focused on negative autobiographical memories using cognitive strategies designed to facilitate (feel strategy) versus undermine (analyze and acc ...[more]

PMID: 19058792

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Project description:Functional neuroimaging evidence suggests that there are differences in the neural correlates of episodic memory for laboratory stimuli (laboratory memory) and for events from one's own life (autobiographical memory). However, this evidence is scarce and often confounded with differences in memory testing procedures. Here, we directly compared the neural mechanisms underlying the search and recovery of autobiographical and laboratory memories while minimizing testing differences. Before scanning, participants completed a laboratory memory encoding task in which they studied four-word "chains" spread across three word pairs. During scanning, participants completed a laboratory memory retrieval task, in which they recalled the word chains, and an autobiographical memory retrieval task, in which they recalled specific personal events associated with word cues. Importantly, response times were similar in the two tasks, allowing for a direct comparison of the activation time courses. We found that during memory search (searching for the memory target), similar brain regions were activated during both the autobiographical and laboratory tasks, whereas during memory recovery (accessing the memory traces; i.e., ecphory), clear differences emerged: regions of the default mode network (DMN) were activated greater during autobiographical than laboratory memory, whereas the bilateral superior parietal lobules were activated greater during laboratory than autobiographical memory. Also, multivariate functional connectivity analyses revealed that regardless of memory stage, the DMN and ventral attention network exhibited a more integrated topology in the functional network underlying autobiographical (vs. laboratory) memory retrieval, whereas the fronto-parietal task control network exhibited a more integrated topology in the functional network underlying laboratory (vs. autobiographical) memory retrieval. These findings further characterize the shared and distinct neural components underlying autobiographical and laboratory memories, and suggest that differences in autobiographical vs. laboratory memory brain activation previously reported in the literature reflect memory recovery rather than search differences.

Dataset Information

Coping with emotions past: the neural bases of regulating affect associated with negative autobiographical memories.

Publications

Coping with emotions past: the neural bases of regulating affect associated with negative autobiographical memories.

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