Li Bingbing, Cheng Gang, Zhang Dajun, Wei Dongtao, Qiao Lei, Wang Xiangpeng, Che Xianwei
School of Psychology, Southwest University, Chongqing, China.
Center for Mental Health Education, Southwest University, Chongqing, China.
PLoS One. 2016 Dec 15;11(12):e0166860. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0166860. eCollection 2016.
Recent neuroimaging studies suggest that neutral infant faces compared to neutral adult faces elicit greater activity in brain areas associated with face processing, attention, empathic response, reward, and movement. However, whether infant facial expressions evoke larger brain responses than adult facial expressions remains unclear. Here, we performed event-related functional magnetic resonance imaging in nulliparous women while they were presented with images of matched unfamiliar infant and adult facial expressions (happy, neutral, and uncomfortable/sad) in a pseudo-randomized order. We found that the bilateral fusiform and right lingual gyrus were overall more activated during the presentation of infant facial expressions compared to adult facial expressions. Uncomfortable infant faces compared to sad adult faces evoked greater activation in the bilateral fusiform gyrus, precentral gyrus, postcentral gyrus, posterior cingulate cortex-thalamus, and precuneus. Neutral infant faces activated larger brain responses in the left fusiform gyrus compared to neutral adult faces. Happy infant faces compared to happy adult faces elicited larger responses in areas of the brain associated with emotion and reward processing using a more liberal threshold of p < 0.005 uncorrected. Furthermore, the level of the test subjects' Interest-In-Infants was positively associated with the intensity of right fusiform gyrus response to infant faces and uncomfortable infant faces compared to sad adult faces. In addition, the Perspective Taking subscale score on the Interpersonal Reactivity Index-Chinese was significantly correlated with precuneus activity during uncomfortable infant faces compared to sad adult faces. Our findings suggest that regional brain areas may bias cognitive and emotional responses to infant facial expressions compared to adult facial expressions among nulliparous women, and this bias may be modulated by individual differences in Interest-In-Infants and perspective taking ability.
最近的神经影像学研究表明，与中性成人面孔相比，中性婴儿面孔在与面部处理、注意力、共情反应、奖励和运动相关的脑区引发更大的活动。然而，婴儿面部表情是否比成人面部表情引发更大的大脑反应仍不清楚。在这里，我们对未生育的女性进行了事件相关功能磁共振成像，她们以伪随机顺序观看匹配的陌生婴儿和成人面部表情（快乐、中性和不舒服/悲伤）的图像。我们发现，与成人面部表情相比，在呈现婴儿面部表情时，双侧梭状回和右侧舌回总体上激活程度更高。与悲伤的成人面孔相比，不舒服的婴儿面孔在双侧梭状回、中央前回、中央后回、后扣带回-丘脑和楔前叶引发更大的激活。与中性成人面孔相比，中性婴儿面孔在左侧梭状回激活更大的大脑反应。与快乐的成人面孔相比，快乐的婴儿面孔在与情绪和奖励处理相关的脑区引发更大的反应，使用更宽松的p<0.005未校正阈值。此外，测试对象对婴儿的兴趣水平与右侧梭状回对婴儿面孔和不舒服的婴儿面孔（与悲伤的成人面孔相比）的反应强度呈正相关。此外，人际反应指数-中文中的观点采择子量表得分与不舒服的婴儿面孔（与悲伤的成人面孔相比）期间楔前叶的活动显著相关。我们的研究结果表明，与未生育女性中的成人面部表情相比，区域脑区可能对婴儿面部表情存在认知和情绪反应偏差，这种偏差可能受对婴儿的兴趣和观点采择能力的个体差异调节。
