Department of Psychology, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London, De Crespigny Park, PO78, SE5 8AF, London, UK.
Eur Psychiatry. 2013 May;28(4):225-34. doi: 10.1016/j.eurpsy.2012.03.002. Epub 2012 Sep 1.
Violent behaviour has been associated with presence of certain mental disorders, most notably antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) and schizophrenia, childhood abuse, and multiple brain abnormalities. This study examined for the first time, to the authors' knowledge, the role of psychosocial deprivation (PSD), including childhood physical and sexual abuse, in structural brain volumes of violent individuals with ASPD or schizophrenia.
Fifty-six men (26 with ASPD or schizophrenia and a history of serious violence, 30 non-violent) underwent magnetic resonance imaging and were assessed on PSD. Stereological volumetric brain ratings were examined for group differences and their association with PSD ratings. PSD-brain associations were examined further using voxel-based-morphometry.
The findings revealed: reduced thalamic volume in psychosocially-deprived violent individuals, relative to non-deprived violent individuals and healthy controls; negative association between thalamic volume and abuse ratings (physical and sexual) in violent individuals; and trend-level negative associations between PSD and hippocampal and prefrontal volumes in non-violent individuals. The voxel-based-morphometry analysis detected a negative association between PSD and localised grey matter volumes in the left inferior frontal region across all individuals, and additionally in the left middle frontal and precentral gyri in non-violent individuals.
Violent mentally-disordered individuals with PSD, relative to those with no or minimal PSD, suffer from an additional brain deficit, i.e., reduced thalamic volume; this may affect sensory information processing, and have implications for management, of these individuals. PSD may have a stronger relationship with volumetric loss of stress-linked regions, namely the frontal cortex, in non-violent individuals.
暴力行为与某些精神障碍有关，尤其是反社会人格障碍（ASPD）和精神分裂症、儿童期虐待和多种脑异常。本研究首次检查了作者所知的心理社会剥夺（PSD），包括儿童期身体和性虐待，在具有 ASPD 或精神分裂症和严重暴力史的暴力个体的结构性脑容量中的作用。
56 名男性（26 名具有 ASPD 或精神分裂症和严重暴力史，30 名非暴力）接受了磁共振成像检查，并进行了 PSD 评估。对组间差异及其与 PSD 评分的相关性进行了立体学体积脑评分检查。进一步使用基于体素的形态测量学检查 PSD-脑关联。
研究结果显示：与非剥夺性暴力个体和健康对照组相比，心理社会剥夺性暴力个体的丘脑体积减少；暴力个体的丘脑体积与虐待评分（身体和性虐待）呈负相关；非暴力个体的 PSD 与海马和前额叶体积呈负相关趋势。基于体素的形态测量学分析在所有个体中检测到 PSD 与左侧额下回局部灰质体积之间的负相关，在非暴力个体中还检测到 PSD 与左侧额中回和中央前回之间的负相关。
与 PSD 较少或无 PSD 的暴力精神障碍个体相比，具有 PSD 的个体遭受额外的脑缺陷，即丘脑体积减少；这可能影响这些个体的感觉信息处理，并对其管理产生影响。在非暴力个体中，PSD 可能与应激相关区域的体积损失（即额叶皮层）有更强的关系。
