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Alcoholism gender differences in brain responsivity to emotional stimuli.

ABSTRACT: Men and women may use alcohol to regulate emotions differently, with corresponding differences in neural responses. We explored how the viewing of different types of emotionally salient stimuli impacted brain activity observed through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) from 42 long-term abstinent alcoholic (25 women) and 46 nonalcoholic (24 women) participants. Analyses revealed blunted brain responsivity in alcoholic compared to nonalcoholic groups, as well as gender differences in those activation patterns. Brain activation in alcoholic men (ALCM) was significantly lower than in nonalcoholic men (NCM) in regions including rostral middle and superior frontal cortex, precentral gyrus, and inferior parietal cortex, whereas activation was higher in alcoholic women (ALCW) than in nonalcoholic women (NCW) in superior frontal and supramarginal cortical regions. The reduced brain reactivity of ALCM, and increases for ALCW, highlighted divergent brain regions and gender effects, suggesting possible differences in the underlying basis for development of alcohol use disorders.

SUBMITTER: Sawyer KS

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6491039 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Alcoholism gender differences in brain responsivity to emotional stimuli.

Sawyer Kayle S KS Maleki Nasim N Urban Trinity T Marinkovic Ksenija K Karson Steven S Ruiz Susan M SM Harris Gordon J GJ Oscar-Berman Marlene M

eLife 20190430

Men and women may use alcohol to regulate emotions differently, with corresponding differences in neural responses. We explored how the viewing of different types of emotionally salient stimuli impacted brain activity observed through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) from 42 long-term abstinent alcoholic (25 women) and 46 nonalcoholic (24 women) participants. Analyses revealed blunted brain responsivity in alcoholic compared to nonalcoholic groups, as well as gender differences in th ...[more]

PMID: 31038125

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Project description:Introduction: The prediction of antidepressant treatment response may improve outcome. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) of emotion processing in major depressive disorder (MDD) may reveal regional brain function serving as predictors of response to treatment with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI). Methods: We examined the association between pre-treatment neural activity by means of fMRI during the perception of emotional stimuli in 22 patients with MDD and the treatment outcome after 6 weeks' medication with an SSRI. A whole brain correlation analysis with Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) change between pre- to post-treatment was conducted to identify neural regions associated with treatment response. Results: During the perception of positive stimuli, responders were characterized by more activation in posterior cingulate cortex (PCC), medial prefrontal cortex, and thalamus as well as middle temporal gyrus. During perception of negative stimuli, PCC, and pregenual anterior cingulate cortex showed the highest correlation with treatment response. Furthermore, responders exhibited higher activation to emotional stimuli than to neutral stimuli in all the above-mentioned regions, while non-responders demonstrated an attenuated neural response to emotional compared to neutral stimuli. Conclusion: Our data suggest that the activity of distinct brain regions is correlated with SSRI treatment outcome and may serve as treatment response predictor. While some regions, in which activity was correlated with treatment response, can be assigned to networks that have been implied in the pathophysiology of depression, most of our regions of interest could also be matched to the default mode network (DMN). Higher DMN activity has been associated with increased rumination as well as negative self-referential processing in previous studies. This may suggest our responders to SSRI to be characterized by such dysregulations and that SSRIs might modify the function associated with this network.

Dataset Information

Alcoholism gender differences in brain responsivity to emotional stimuli.

Publications

Alcoholism gender differences in brain responsivity to emotional stimuli.

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