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An anterior-to-posterior shift in midline cortical activity in schizophrenia during self-reflection.

ABSTRACT: Deficits in social cognition, including impairments in self-awareness, contribute to the overall functional disability associated with schizophrenia. Studies in healthy subjects have shown that social cognitive functions, including self-reflection, rely on the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and posterior cingulate gyrus, and these regions exhibit highly correlated activity during "resting" states. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that patients with schizophrenia show dysfunction of this network during self-reflection and that this abnormal activity is associated with changes in the strength of resting-state correlations between these regions.Activation during self-reflection and control tasks was measured with functional magnetic resonance imaging in 19 patients with schizophrenia and 20 demographically matched control subjects. In addition, the resting-state functional connectivity of midline cortical areas showing abnormal self-reflection-related activation in schizophrenia was measured.Compared with control subjects, the schizophrenia patients demonstrated lower activation of the right ventral mPFC and greater activation of the mid/posterior cingulate gyri bilaterally during self-reflection, relative to a control task. A similar pattern was seen during overall social reflection. In addition, functional connectivity between the portion of the left mid/posterior cingulate gyrus showing abnormally elevated activity during self-reflection in schizophrenia, and the dorsal anterior cingulate gyrus was lower in the schizophrenia patients compared with control subjects.Schizophrenia is associated with an anterior-to-posterior shift in introspection-related activation, as well as changes in functional connectivity, of the midline cortex. These findings provide support for the hypothesis that aberrant midline cortical function contributes to social cognitive impairment in schizophrenia.

SUBMITTER: Holt DJ

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3740539 | biostudies-other | 2011 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other

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An anterior-to-posterior shift in midline cortical activity in schizophrenia during self-reflection.

Holt Daphne J DJ Cassidy Brittany S BS Andrews-Hanna Jessica R JR Lee Su Mei SM Coombs Garth G Goff Donald C DC Gabrieli John D JD Moran Joseph M JM

Biological psychiatry 20101208 5

<h4>Background</h4>Deficits in social cognition, including impairments in self-awareness, contribute to the overall functional disability associated with schizophrenia. Studies in healthy subjects have shown that social cognitive functions, including self-reflection, rely on the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and posterior cingulate gyrus, and these regions exhibit highly correlated activity during "resting" states. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that patients with schizophrenia show d ...[more]

PMID: 21144498

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Project description:Background:The innate alarm system consists of a subcortical network of interconnected midbrain, lower brainstem, and thalamic nuclei, which together mediate the detection of evolutionarily-relevant stimuli. The periaqueductal gray is a midbrain structure innervated by the innate alarm system that coordinates the expression of defensive states following threat detection. In participants with post-traumatic stress disorder, the periaqueductal gray displays overactivation during the subliminal presentation of trauma-related stimuli as well as altered resting-state functional connectivity. Aberrant functional connectivity is also reported in post-traumatic stress disorder for the default-mode network, a large-scale brain network recruited during self-referential processing and autobiographical memory. Here, research lacks investigation on the extent to which functional interactions are displayed between the midbrain and the large-scale cortical networks in post-traumatic stress disorder. Methods:Using a subliminal threat presentation paradigm, we investigated psycho-physiological interactions during functional neuroimaging in participants with post-traumatic stress disorder (n = 26) and healthy control subjects (n = 20). Functional connectivity of the periaqueductal gray was investigated across the whole-brain of each participant during subliminal exposure to trauma-related and neutral word stimuli. Results:As compared to controls during subliminal threat presentation, the post-traumatic stress disorder group showed significantly greater periaqueductal gray functional connectivity with regions of the default-mode network (i.e., angular gyrus, precuneus, superior frontal gyrus). Moreover, multiple regression analyses revealed that the functional connectivity between the periaqueductal gray and the regions of the default-mode network correlated positively to symptoms of avoidance and state dissociation in post-traumatic stress disorder. Conclusion:Given that the periaqueductal gray engages the expression of defensive states, stronger midbrain functional coupling with the default-mode network may have clinical implications to self-referential and trauma-related processing in participants with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Dataset Information

An anterior-to-posterior shift in midline cortical activity in schizophrenia during self-reflection.

Publications

An anterior-to-posterior shift in midline cortical activity in schizophrenia during self-reflection.

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