Yale Child Study Center, Yale School of Medicine, 230 South Frontage Road, New Haven, CT 06510, USA.
Dev Cogn Neurosci. 2011 Jul;1(3):324-37. doi: 10.1016/j.dcn.2011.03.004.
The ability to regulate one's emotions is critical to mental health and well-being, and is impaired in a wide range of psychopathologies, some of which initially manifest in childhood or adolescence. Cognitive reappraisal is a particular approach to emotion regulation frequently utilized in behavioral psychotherapies. Despite a wealth of research on cognitive reappraisal in adults, little is known about the developmental trajectory of brain mechanisms subserving this form of emotion regulation in children. In this functional magnetic resonance imaging study, we asked children and adolescents to up-and down-regulate their response to disgusting images, as the experience of disgust has been linked to anxiety disorders. We demonstrate distinct patterns of brain activation during successful up- and down-regulation of emotion, as well as an inverse correlation between activity in ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) and limbic structures during down-regulation, suggestive of a potential regulatory role for vmPFC. Further, we show age-related effects on activity in PFC and amygdala. These findings have important clinical implications for the understanding of cognitive-based therapies in anxiety disorders in childhood and adolescence.
调节情绪的能力对心理健康和幸福感至关重要，在广泛的精神病理学中受到损害，其中一些最初在儿童或青少年时期表现出来。认知重评是一种常用于行为心理治疗的情绪调节方法。尽管成年人的认知重评研究很多，但对于支持儿童这种情绪调节形式的大脑机制的发展轨迹知之甚少。在这项功能磁共振成像研究中，我们要求儿童和青少年调整他们对恶心图像的反应，因为恶心的体验与焦虑症有关。我们在成功地调节情绪时展示了不同的大脑激活模式，以及在情绪下调过程中腹内侧前额叶皮层 (vmPFC) 和边缘结构之间的活动呈负相关，这表明 vmPFC 可能具有潜在的调节作用。此外，我们还显示了与年龄相关的 PFC 和杏仁核活动的影响。这些发现对理解儿童和青少年焦虑症中的认知为基础的治疗具有重要的临床意义。
