Department of Neurology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, Hefei, China; Department of Medical Psychology, Anhui Medical University, Hefei, China; Collaborative Innovation Centre of Neuropsychiatric Disorders and Mental Health, Anhui Province, China.
Department of Medical Psychology, Anhui Medical University, Hefei, China; Collaborative Innovation Centre of Neuropsychiatric Disorders and Mental Health, Anhui Province, China.
Psychiatry Res. 2017 May;251:155-161. doi: 10.1016/j.psychres.2017.02.018. Epub 2017 Feb 9.
Previous behavioral studies have demonstrated an effect of eye gaze direction on the processing of emotional expressions in adults with social anxiety. However, specific brain responses to the interaction between gaze direction and facial expressions in social anxiety remain unclear. The present study aimed to explore the time course of such interaction using event-related potentials (ERPs) in participants with social anxiety. High socially anxious individuals and low socially anxious individuals were asked to identify the gender of angry or neutral faces with direct or averted gaze while their behavioral performance and electrophysiological data were monitored. We found that identification of angry faces with direct but not averted gaze elicited larger N2 amplitude in high socially anxious individuals compared to low socially anxious individuals, while identification of neutral faces did not produce any gaze modulation effect. Moreover, the N2 was correlated with increased anxiety severity upon exposure to angry faces with direct gaze. Therefore, our results suggest that gaze direction modulates the processing of threatening faces in social anxiety. The N2 component elicited by angry faces with direct gaze could be a state-dependent biomarker of social anxiety and may be an important reference biomarker for social anxiety diagnosis and intervention.
先前的行为研究表明，目光方向对视社交焦虑成人情绪表达的处理有影响。然而，社交焦虑中注视方向和面部表情之间相互作用的特定大脑反应尚不清楚。本研究旨在使用事件相关电位 (ERP) 探讨社交焦虑患者中这种相互作用的时间进程。要求高社交焦虑个体和低社交焦虑个体在识别具有直接或转移目光的愤怒或中性面孔的性别时，监测他们的行为表现和脑电图数据。我们发现，与低社交焦虑个体相比，高社交焦虑个体在识别具有直接但不转移目光的愤怒面孔时，N2 振幅更大，而识别中性面孔时则没有产生任何注视调制效应。此外，N2 与暴露于具有直接注视的愤怒面孔时的焦虑严重程度增加相关。因此，我们的结果表明，注视方向调节了社交焦虑中威胁面孔的处理。具有直接注视的愤怒面孔引起的 N2 成分可能是社交焦虑的状态依赖生物标志物，可能是社交焦虑诊断和干预的重要参考生物标志物。
