Straube Thomas, Mentzel Hans-Joachim, Miltner Wolfgang H R
Department of Biological and Clinical Psychology, Friedrich Schiller University, Am Steiger 3/1, DE-07743 Jena, Germany.
Neuropsychobiology. 2005;52(3):163-8. doi: 10.1159/000087987. Epub 2005 Aug 25.
Little is known about the functional neuroanatomy underlying the processing of emotional stimuli in social phobia.
To investigate specific brain activation that is associated with the processing of threat and safety signals in social phobics.
Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, brain activation was measured in social phobic and nonphobic subjects during the presentation of angry, happy and neutral facial expressions under free viewing conditions.
Compared to controls, phobics showed increased activation of extrastriate visual cortex regardless of facial expression. Angry, but not neutral or happy, faces elicited greater insula responses in phobics. In contrast, both angry and happy faces led to increased amygdala activation in phobics.
The results support the hypothesis that the amygdala is involved in the processing of negative and positive stimuli. Furthermore, social phobics respond sensitively not only to threatening but also to accepting faces and common and distinct neural mechanisms appear to be associated with the processing of threat versus safety signals.
社交恐惧症患者在处理情绪刺激时的功能性神经解剖学知之甚少。
研究社交恐惧症患者中与威胁和安全信号处理相关的特定脑激活情况。
使用功能磁共振成像，在自由观看条件下向社交恐惧症患者和非恐惧症患者呈现愤怒、高兴和中性面部表情时测量脑激活情况。
与对照组相比，无论面部表情如何，恐惧症患者的纹外视觉皮层激活均增加。愤怒面孔（而非中性或高兴面孔）在恐惧症患者中引发更大的脑岛反应。相反，愤怒和高兴面孔均导致恐惧症患者杏仁核激活增加。
结果支持杏仁核参与负面和正面刺激处理的假说。此外，社交恐惧症患者不仅对威胁性面孔敏感，对友善面孔也敏感，并且似乎存在与威胁信号和安全信号处理相关的共同及不同神经机制。
