Mériau Katja, Wartenburger Isabell, Kazzer Philipp, Prehn Kristin, Lammers Claas-Hinrich, van der Meer Elke, Villringer Arno, Heekeren Hauke R
Berlin NeuroImaging Center, Department of Neurology, Charité University Medicine Berlin, Campus Mitte, Berlin, Germany.
Neuroimage. 2006 Nov 15;33(3):1016-27. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2006.07.031. Epub 2006 Sep 14.
Even simple perceptual decisions are influenced by the emotional content of a stimulus. Recent neuroimaging studies provide evidence about the neural mechanisms of perceptual decision making on emotional stimuli. However, the effect of individual differences in cognitive processing of emotions on perceptual decision making remains poorly understood. Here, we investigated how changes in the fMRI signal during perceptual decision making on facial stimuli covaried with individual differences in the ability to identify and communicate one's emotional state. Although this personality trait covaried with changes in activity in the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) during gender decisions on facial expressions, there was no correlation during emotion decisions. Further, we investigated whether individual differences in the ability to cognitively process emotions depend on differences in the functional integration of emotional and cognitive brain regions. We therefore compared task-dependent changes in effective connectivity of dACC in individuals with good and with poor ability to cognitively process emotions using a psychophysiological interaction analysis. We found greater coupling of dACC with prefrontal regions in individuals with good ability to identify and communicate their emotional state. Conversely, individuals with poor ability in this domain showed greater coupling of dACC with the amygdala. Our data indicate that individual differences in the ability to identify and communicate one's emotional state are reflected by altered effective connectivity of the dACC with prefrontal and limbic regions. Thus, we provide neurophysiological evidence for a theoretical model that posits that a discommunication between limbic areas and the neocortex impairs cognitive processing of emotions.
即使是简单的知觉决策也会受到刺激情绪内容的影响。最近的神经影像学研究为关于情绪刺激的知觉决策的神经机制提供了证据。然而，情绪认知加工中的个体差异对知觉决策的影响仍知之甚少。在此，我们研究了在对面部刺激进行知觉决策过程中功能磁共振成像（fMRI）信号的变化如何与个体在识别和表达自身情绪状态能力上的差异相关联。尽管这种人格特质在对面部表情进行性别决策时与背侧前扣带回皮质（dACC）的活动变化相关，但在情绪决策时却没有相关性。此外，我们研究了情绪认知加工能力的个体差异是否取决于情绪和认知脑区功能整合的差异。因此，我们使用心理生理交互分析比较了情绪认知加工能力强和弱的个体中dACC有效连接的任务依赖性变化。我们发现，在识别和表达自身情绪状态能力强的个体中，dACC与前额叶区域的耦合更强。相反，在该领域能力弱的个体中，dACC与杏仁核的耦合更强。我们的数据表明，识别和表达自身情绪状态能力的个体差异通过dACC与前额叶和边缘区域有效连接的改变得以体现。因此，我们为一个理论模型提供了神经生理学证据，该模型假定边缘区域与新皮质之间的信息交流不畅会损害情绪的认知加工。
