Leppänen Jukka M
Human Information Processing Laboratory, Department of Psychology, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland.
Curr Opin Psychiatry. 2006 Jan;19(1):34-9. doi: 10.1097/01.yco.0000191500.46411.00.
A relatively long history of research has shown that mood disorders are associated with abnormalities in the processing of emotional stimuli. Only the most recent studies, however, have begun to elucidate the specificity and neural basis of these abnormalities. This article reviews and discusses the results of these studies.
Individuals diagnosed with major depressive disorder exhibit an attentional bias toward negative emotional cues (e.g. sad faces), an attentional bias away from positive emotional cues (e.g. happy faces), and an enhanced memory for negative emotional material. Compared with healthy controls, individuals with major depressive disorder show increased neural activity in response to sad faces and diminished neural activity in response to happy faces in emotion-related brain circuits (e.g. amygdala and ventral striatum). Some of these abnormalities in the processing of emotional information persist after symptom remission and they have also been found in healthy individuals who are at heightened risk for the development of mood disorders.
The reviewed data show that major depressive disorder involves specific abnormalities in the cognitive and neural processing of emotional information and that these abnormalities may potentially contribute to the vulnerability for negative emotion and onset of depressive episodes.
较长时间的研究表明，情绪障碍与情绪刺激处理异常有关。然而，直到最近的研究才开始阐明这些异常的特异性和神经基础。本文回顾并讨论了这些研究结果。
被诊断为重度抑郁症的个体对负面情绪线索（如悲伤的面孔）表现出注意力偏向，对正面情绪线索（如快乐的面孔）表现出注意力偏离，并且对负面情绪材料的记忆增强。与健康对照组相比，重度抑郁症患者在与情绪相关的脑回路（如杏仁核和腹侧纹状体）中，对悲伤面孔的神经活动增加，而对快乐面孔的神经活动减少。情绪信息处理中的一些异常在症状缓解后仍然存在，并且在患情绪障碍风险较高的健康个体中也有发现。
综述数据表明，重度抑郁症涉及情绪信息认知和神经处理方面的特定异常，这些异常可能会增加负面情绪的易感性以及抑郁发作的可能性。
