Regional Department for Eating Disorders, Division of Mental Health and Addiction, Oslo University Hospital, Oslo, Norway.
Regional Department for Eating Disorders, Division of Mental Health and Addiction, Oslo University Hospital, Oslo, Norway; Division of Mental Health and Addiction, Institute of Clinical Medicine, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway.
Psychiatry Res Neuroimaging. 2016 Feb 28;248:126-33. doi: 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2015.12.008. Epub 2015 Dec 29.
The pathophysiology of anorexia nervosa (AN) is not completely understood, but research suggests that alterations in brain circuits related to cognitive control and emotion are central. The aim of this study was to explore neural responses to an emotional conflict task in women recovered from AN. Functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to measure neural responses to an emotional conflict task in 22 women recovered from AN and 21 age-matched healthy controls. The task involved categorizing affective faces while ignoring affective words. Face and word stimuli were either congruent (non-conflict) or incongruent (conflict). Brain responses to emotional conflict did not differ between groups. However, in response to emotional non-conflict, women recovered from AN relative to healthy controls showed significantly less activation in the bilateral amygdala. Specifically, while emotional non-conflict evoked significant activations of the amygdala in healthy controls, recovered AN women did not show such activations. Similar significant group differences were also observed in the hippocampus and basal ganglia. These results suggest that women recovered from AN are characterized by alterations within emotion-related brain circuits. Recovered women's absence of amygdala and hippocampus activation during non-conflict trials possibly reflects an impaired ability to process emotional significant stimuli.
神经性厌食症（AN）的病理生理学尚未完全阐明，但研究表明，与认知控制和情绪相关的大脑回路改变是其核心。本研究旨在探讨从 AN 中恢复的女性对情绪冲突任务的神经反应。使用功能磁共振成像测量 22 名从 AN 中恢复的女性和 21 名年龄匹配的健康对照者对情绪冲突任务的神经反应。该任务涉及在忽略情感词的情况下对情感面孔进行分类。面孔和单词刺激要么一致（无冲突），要么不一致（冲突）。两组之间对情绪冲突的大脑反应没有差异。然而，在对情绪无冲突的情况下，与健康对照组相比，从 AN 中恢复的女性双侧杏仁核的激活明显减少。具体来说，在健康对照组中，情绪无冲突会引起杏仁核的显著激活，而从 AN 中恢复的女性则没有这种激活。在海马体和基底神经节也观察到类似的显著组间差异。这些结果表明，从 AN 中恢复的女性表现出与情绪相关的大脑回路改变。在无冲突试验中，恢复的女性杏仁核和海马体的激活缺失可能反映了处理情绪显著刺激的能力受损。
