Dataset Information

Brain mediators of cardiovascular responses to social threat: part I: Reciprocal dorsal and ventral sub-regions of the medial prefrontal cortex and heart-rate reactivity.

ABSTRACT: Social threat is a key component of mental "stress" and a potent generator of negative emotions and physiological responses in the body. How the human brain processes social context and drives peripheral physiology, however, is relatively poorly understood. Human neuroimaging and animal studies implicate the dorsal medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC), though this heterogeneous region is likely to contain multiple sub-regions with diverse relationships with physiological reactivity and regulation. We used fMRI combined with a novel multi-level path analysis approach to identify brain mediators of the effects of a public speech preparation task (social evaluative threat, SET) on heart rate (HR). This model provides tests of functional pathways linking experimentally manipulated threat, regional fMRI activity, and physiological output, both across time (within person) and across individuals (between persons). It thus integrates time series connectivity and individual difference analyses in the same path model. The results provide evidence for two dissociable, inversely coupled sub-regions of MPFC that independently mediated HR responses. SET caused activity increases in a more dorsal pregenual cingulate region, whose activity was coupled with HR increases. Conversely, SET caused activity decreases in a right ventromedial/medial orbital region, which were coupled with HR increases. Individual differences in coupling strength in each pathway independently predicted individual differences in HR reactivity. These results underscore both the importance and heterogeneity of MPFC in generating physiological responses to threat.

SUBMITTER: Wager TD

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3275821 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Brain mediators of cardiovascular responses to social threat: part I: Reciprocal dorsal and ventral sub-regions of the medial prefrontal cortex and heart-rate reactivity.

Wager Tor D TD Waugh Christian E CE Lindquist Martin M Noll Doug C DC Fredrickson Barbara L BL Taylor Stephan F SF

NeuroImage 20090522 3

Social threat is a key component of mental "stress" and a potent generator of negative emotions and physiological responses in the body. How the human brain processes social context and drives peripheral physiology, however, is relatively poorly understood. Human neuroimaging and animal studies implicate the dorsal medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC), though this heterogeneous region is likely to contain multiple sub-regions with diverse relationships with physiological reactivity and regulation. We ...[more]

PMID: 19465137

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Project description:Background and aimsThe prefrontal cortex (PFC) is modulated by dopaminergic and glutamatergic neurons that project from the ventral tegmental area (VTA) and disruption of this modulation might facilitate impulsive behaviors during cocaine intoxication. Here, we assessed the effects of acute cocaine (30 mg/kg, i.p.) on the reactivity of the PFC to VTA stimulation.MethodsUsing a genetically encoded calcium indicator (GCaMP6f), we optically imaged the neuronal Ca2+ reactance in medial PFC (mPFC) in response to 'tonic-like' (5 Hz) and 'phasic-like' (50 Hz) electrical VTA stimulation. The high temporal and spatial resolutions of our optical system allowed us to capture single Ca2+ neuronal transients from individual stimuli with 'tonic-like' stimulation and to visualize single neuronal activation evoked by 'phasic-like' VTA stimulation.Results'Tonic-like' VTA stimulation induced a rapid increase in mean neuronal Ca2+ in mPFC followed by a plateau and recovery upon termination of stimulation. After cocaine, the mPFC sensitivity to 'tonic-like' VTA stimulation was attenuated, with a 50.4% reduction (P = 0.03) in the number of Ca2+ transients corresponding to single electrical stimuli but the recovery time was lengthened (4.30 ± 0.25 sec to 5.41 ± 0.24 sec, P = 0.03). 'Phasic-like' stimulation evoked a rapid Ca2+ fluorescence increase in mPFC with an immediate decay process, and while cocaine did not affect the peak response (7.17 ± 1.07% versus 7.13 ± 0.96%, P = 0.98) it shortened the recovery time to baseline (3.27 ± 0.11 sec versus 2.38 ± 0.23 sec, P = 0.005).ConclusionsAcute cocaine impairs reactivity of medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) to ventral tegmental area stimulation, decreasing its sensitivity to 'tonic-like' stimulation and lengthening the recovery time to return to baseline while shortening it for phasic stimulation. These changes in mPFC might contribute to cocaine binging during intoxication.

Project description:Conditioned changes in the emotional response to threat (e.g. aversive unconditioned stimulus; UCS) are mediated in part by the prefrontal cortex (PFC). Unpredictable threats elicit large emotional responses, while the response is diminished when the threat is predictable. A better understanding of how PFC connectivity to other brain regions varies with threat predictability would provide important insights into the neural processes that mediate conditioned diminution of the emotional response to threat. The present study examined brain connectivity during predictable and unpredictable threat exposure using a fear conditioning paradigm (previously published in Wood et al., 2012) in which unconditioned functional magnetic resonance imaging data were reanalyzed to assess effective connectivity. Granger causality analysis was performed using the time series data from 15 activated regions of interest after hemodynamic deconvolution, to determine regional effective connectivity. In addition, connectivity path weights were correlated with trait anxiety measures to assess the relationship between negative affect and brain connectivity. Results indicate the dorsomedial PFC (dmPFC) serves as a neural hub that influences activity in other brain regions when threats are unpredictable. In contrast, the dorsolateral PFC (dlPFC) serves as a neural hub that influences the activity of other brain regions when threats are predictable. These findings are consistent with the view that the dmPFC coordinates brain activity to take action, perhaps in a reactive manner, when an unpredicted threat is encountered, while the dlPFC coordinates brain regions to take action, in what may be a more proactive manner, to respond to predictable threats. Further, dlPFC connectivity to other brain regions (e.g. ventromedial PFC, amygdala, and insula) varied with negative affect (i.e. trait anxiety) when the UCS was predictable, suggesting that stronger connectivity may be required for emotion regulation in individuals with higher levels of negative affect.

Dataset Information

Brain mediators of cardiovascular responses to social threat: part I: Reciprocal dorsal and ventral sub-regions of the medial prefrontal cortex and heart-rate reactivity.

Publications

Brain mediators of cardiovascular responses to social threat: part I: Reciprocal dorsal and ventral sub-regions of the medial prefrontal cortex and heart-rate reactivity.

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