Aust Sabine, Alkan Härtwig Elif, Koelsch Stefan, Heekeren Hauke R, Heuser Isabella, Bajbouj Malek
Cluster of Excellence "Languages of Emotion", Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion, Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, and Department of Psychiatry, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Campus Benjamin Franklin, Eschenallee 3, 14150 Berlin, GermanyCluster of Excellence "Languages of Emotion", Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion, Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, and Department of Psychiatry, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Campus Benjamin Franklin, Eschenallee 3, 14150 Berlin, GermanyCluster of Excellence "Languages of Emotion", Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion, Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, and Department of Psychiatry, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Campus Benjamin Franklin, Eschenallee 3, 14150 Berlin, Germany
Cluster of Excellence "Languages of Emotion", Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion, Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, and Department of Psychiatry, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Campus Benjamin Franklin, Eschenallee 3, 14150 Berlin, GermanyCluster of Excellence "Languages of Emotion", Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, Dahlem Institute for Neuroimaging of Emotion, Freie Universität Berlin, Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin, Germany, and Department of Psychiatry, Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin, Campus Benjamin Franklin, Eschenallee 3, 14150 Berlin, Germany.
Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2014 Jul;9(7):1038-45. doi: 10.1093/scan/nst078. Epub 2013 May 17.
Early life stress (ELS) is known to have considerable influence on brain development, mental health and affective functioning. Previous investigations have shown that alexithymia, a prevalent personality trait associated with difficulties experiencing and verbalizing emotions, is particularly related to ELS. The aim of the present study was to investigate how neural correlates of emotional experiences in alexithymia are altered in the presence and absence of ELS. Therefore, 50 healthy individuals with different levels of alexithymia were matched regarding ELS and investigated with respect to neural correlates of audio-visually induced emotional experiences via functional magnetic resonance imaging. The main finding was that ELS modulated hippocampal responses to pleasant (>neutral) stimuli in high-alexithymic individuals, whereas there was no such modulation in low-alexithymic individuals matched for ELS. Behavioral and psychophysiological results followed a similar pattern. When considered independent of ELS, alexithymia was associated with decreased responses in insula (pleasant > neutral) and temporal pole (unpleasant > neutral). Our results show that the influence of ELS on emotional brain responses seems to be modulated by an individual's degree of alexithymia. Potentially, protective and adverse effects of emotional abilities on brain responses to emotional experiences are discussed.
早年生活应激（ELS）已知会对大脑发育、心理健康和情感功能产生重大影响。先前的研究表明，述情障碍是一种普遍存在的人格特质，与体验和表达情感的困难有关，尤其与ELS相关。本研究的目的是调查在有或没有ELS的情况下，述情障碍患者情感体验的神经关联是如何改变的。因此，选取了50名具有不同述情障碍水平的健康个体，根据ELS进行匹配，并通过功能磁共振成像研究视听诱发情感体验的神经关联。主要发现是，ELS调节了高述情障碍个体海马体对愉悦（>中性）刺激的反应，而在匹配了ELS的低述情障碍个体中则没有这种调节。行为和心理生理结果遵循类似模式。当不考虑ELS时，述情障碍与脑岛（愉悦>中性）和颞极（不愉快>中性）反应降低有关。我们的结果表明，ELS对情感脑反应的影响似乎受到个体述情障碍程度的调节。文中还讨论了情感能力对大脑情感体验反应的潜在保护和不利影响。
