School of Psychology, University of Western Australia, Crawley, Western Australia, Australia.
Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Warneford Hospital, Oxford; P1vital Ltd, Wallingford, Oxfordshire, United Kingdom.
Biol Psychiatry. 2014 Dec 15;76(12):946-52. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2014.03.003. Epub 2014 Mar 11.
A pattern of attentional bias for threatening information is thought to be involved in the etiology of anxiety. Consistent with this idea, cognitive training techniques directly targeting such patterns of biased attention have been shown to reduce symptoms of anxiety. Research seeking to establish the neurologic underpinnings of change in the attentional bias for threat have implicated, but not confirmed, the role of lateral prefrontal regions.
The current study sought to confirm experimentally the causal role of lateral prefrontal areas in the modification of attentional bias by delivering targeted cortical stimulation during attention bias modification training to assess the consequent effects on attentional bias change. While completing either an "attend threat" or "avoid threat" attention bias modification task, 77 volunteers (17-22 per group) received either active transcranial direct current stimulation of the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex or a sham stimulation control condition.
Participants receiving active stimulation showed greater evidence of attentional bias acquisition in the targeted direction (toward or away from threat) compared with participants in the sham stimulation condition.
Our findings provide the first experimental evidence that increasing activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex leads to greater evidence of attention bias modification. This evidence confirms the role of these areas in facilitating change in the allocation of attention to threat. We believe this study provides a critical step in the translation of neuroimaging findings to novel neuromodulatory interventions capable of enhancing the treatment of emotional pathology.
注意力偏向威胁信息的模式被认为与焦虑的病因有关。与这一观点一致的是，直接针对这种偏向注意力模式的认知训练技术已被证明可以减轻焦虑症状。研究旨在确定威胁性注意偏向变化的神经基础，暗示但未证实外侧前额叶区域的作用。
本研究通过在注意力偏向修正训练期间给予靶向皮质刺激，来确认外侧前额叶区域在修正注意力偏向中的因果作用，以评估其对注意力偏向变化的后续影响，从而在实验上证实这一作用。77 名志愿者（每组 17-22 人）在完成“关注威胁”或“回避威胁”注意力偏向修正任务时，分别接受左侧背外侧前额叶的经颅直流电刺激或假刺激对照条件。
与接受假刺激的参与者相比，接受主动刺激的参与者在目标方向（朝向或远离威胁）上表现出更大的注意力偏向获取证据。
我们的发现提供了第一个实验证据，证明增加背外侧前额叶皮质的活动会导致更多的注意力偏向修正证据。这一证据证实了这些区域在促进对威胁的注意力分配的改变方面的作用。我们相信，这项研究为将神经影像学发现转化为能够增强情绪病理学治疗的新型神经调节干预措施提供了关键步骤。
