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Frontal-striatum dysfunction during reward processing: Relationships to amotivation in schizophrenia.

ABSTRACT: Schizophrenia is characterized by deficits of context processing, thought to be related to dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) impairment. Despite emerging evidence suggesting a crucial role of the DLPFC in integrating reward and goal information, we do not know whether individuals with schizophrenia can represent and integrate reward-related context information to modulate cognitive control. To address this question, 36 individuals with schizophrenia (n = 29) or schizoaffective disorder (n = 7) and 27 healthy controls performed a variant of a response conflict task (Padmala & Pessoa, 2011) during fMRI scanning, in both baseline and reward conditions, with monetary incentives on some reward trials. We used a mixed state-item design that allowed us to examine both sustained and transient reward effects on cognitive control. Different from predictions about impaired DLPFC function in schizophrenia, we found an intact pattern of increased sustained DLPFC activity during reward versus baseline blocks in individuals with schizophrenia at a group level but blunted sustained activations in the putamen. Contrary to our predictions, individuals with schizophrenia showed blunted cue-related activations in several regions of the basal ganglia responding to reward-predicting cues. Importantly, as predicted, individual differences in anhedonia/amotivation symptoms severity were significantly associated with reduced sustained DLPFC activation in the same region that showed overall increased activity as a function of reward. These results suggest that individual differences in motivational impairments in schizophrenia may be related to dysfunction of the DLPFC and striatum in motivationally salient situations.

SUBMITTER: Chung YS

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5132953 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Frontal-striatum dysfunction during reward processing: Relationships to amotivation in schizophrenia.

Chung Yu Sun YS Barch Deanna M DM

Journal of abnormal psychology 20160204 3

Schizophrenia is characterized by deficits of context processing, thought to be related to dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) impairment. Despite emerging evidence suggesting a crucial role of the DLPFC in integrating reward and goal information, we do not know whether individuals with schizophrenia can represent and integrate reward-related context information to modulate cognitive control. To address this question, 36 individuals with schizophrenia (n = 29) or schizoaffective disorder (n = ...[more]

PMID: 26845257

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Project description:BackgroundReward processing abnormalities may underlie characteristic pleasure and motivational impairments in schizophrenia. Some neural measures of reward processing show age-related modulation, highlighting the importance of considering age effects on reward sensitivity. We compared event-related potentials (ERPs) reflecting reward anticipation (stimulus-preceding negativity, SPN) and evaluation (reward positivity, RewP; late positive potential, LPP) across individuals with schizophrenia (SZ) and healthy controls (HC), with an emphasis on examining the effects of chronological age, brain age (i.e., predicted age based on neurobiological measures), and illness phase.MethodsSubjects underwent EEG while completing a slot-machine task for which rewards were not dependent on performance accuracy, speed, or response preparation. Slot-machine task EEG responses were compared between 54 SZ and 54 HC individuals, ages 19 to 65. Reward-related ERPs were analyzed with respect to chronological age, categorically-defined illness phase (early; ESZ versus chronic schizophrenia; CSZ), and were used to model brain age relative to chronological age.ResultsIllness phase-focused analyses indicated there were no group differences in average SPN or RewP amplitudes. However, a group × reward outcome interaction revealed that ESZ differed from HC in later outcome processing, reflected by greater LPP responses following loss versus reward (a reversal of the HC pattern). While brain age estimates did not differ among groups, depressive symptoms in SZ were associated with older brain age estimates while controlling for negative symptoms.ConclusionsESZ and CSZ did not differ from HC in reward anticipation or early outcome processing during a cognitively undemanding reward task, highlighting areas of preserved functioning. However, ESZ showed altered later reward outcome evaluation, pointing to selective reward deficits during the early illness phase of schizophrenia. Further, an association between ERP-derived brain age and depressive symptoms in SZ extends prior findings linking depression with reward-related ERP blunting. Taken together, both illness phase and age may impact reward processing among SZ, and brain aging may offer a promising, novel marker of reward dysfunction that warrants further study.

Dataset Information

Frontal-striatum dysfunction during reward processing: Relationships to amotivation in schizophrenia.

Publications

Frontal-striatum dysfunction during reward processing: Relationships to amotivation in schizophrenia.

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