Agroskin Dmitrij, Klackl Johannes, Jonas Eva
Department of Psychology, University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria.
PLoS One. 2014 Jan 29;9(1):e86430. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0086430. eCollection 2014.
Abundant evidence suggests that self-esteem is an important personality resource for emotion regulation in response to stressful experiences. It was thus hypothesized that the relative grey matter volume of brain regions involved in responding to and coping with stress is related to individual differences in trait self-esteem. Using structural magnetic resonance imaging of 48 healthy adults in conjunction with voxel-based morphometry and diffeomorphic anatomical registration using exponentiated lie algebra (VBM-DARTEL), positive associations between self-esteem and regional grey matter volume were indeed found in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), right lateral prefrontal cortex (LPFC), right hippocampus, and left hypothalamus. In addition, self-esteem positively covaried with grey matter volume in the right temporo-parietal junction (TPJ), which has been implicated in pride and theory of mind. The results suggest that persons with low self-esteem have reduced grey matter volume in brain regions that contribute to emotion/stress regulation, pride, and theory of mind. The findings provide novel neuroanatomical evidence for the view that self-esteem constitutes a vital coping resource.
大量证据表明，自尊是应对压力经历时进行情绪调节的重要人格资源。因此，有人提出假设，参与应对和处理压力的脑区相对灰质体积与特质自尊的个体差异有关。通过对48名健康成年人进行结构磁共振成像，并结合基于体素的形态测量法和使用指数李代数的微分同胚解剖配准法（VBM-DARTEL），确实发现自尊与前扣带回皮质（ACC）、右侧前额叶皮质（LPFC）、右侧海马体和左侧下丘脑的区域灰质体积呈正相关。此外，自尊与右侧颞顶联合区（TPJ）的灰质体积呈正相关，该区域与自豪感和心理理论有关。结果表明，自尊较低的人在有助于情绪/压力调节、自豪感和心理理论的脑区灰质体积减少。这些发现为自尊构成重要应对资源的观点提供了新的神经解剖学证据。
