Department of Psychology, Louisiana State University, 236 Audubon Hall, Baton Rouge, LA, 70803, USA.
Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Baton Rouge, LA, USA.
Brain Imaging Behav. 2018 Aug;12(4):1084-1098. doi: 10.1007/s11682-017-9772-1.
Neuroscientific and psychological research posits that there are two transdiagnostic facets of anxiety: anxious arousal and anxious apprehension. Though these two facets of anxiety are distinct, they are often subsumed into one domain (e.g., trait anxiety). The primary goal of the current study was to delineate the relationship between anxious arousal and cortical thickness versus the relationship between anxious apprehension and cortical thickness in a sample of typically functioning youth. The secondary aim was to determine where in the brain cortical thickness significantly correlated with both components of anxiety. Results indicated that the right anterior insula has a stronger relationship to anxious arousal, whereas the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and left anterior insula were found to correlate with both anxious arousal and apprehension. We also observed volumetric differences in the amygdala and hippocampus between anxious arousal and anxious apprehension. Whereas anxious arousal, but not apprehension, predicted left amygdala volume, anxious apprehension, but not arousal, predicted right hippocampal volume. These findings demonstrated that there are both differences and similarities in the neural regions that contribute to independent facets of anxiety. Results are discussed in terms of previous findings from the affective and developmental cognitive neurosciences.
神经科学和心理学研究表明，焦虑有两个跨诊断特征：焦虑唤醒和焦虑担忧。尽管这两个焦虑特征是不同的，但它们通常被归入一个领域（例如，特质焦虑）。本研究的主要目的是在一个典型的功能正常的青年样本中，描绘焦虑唤醒和皮质厚度之间的关系，以及焦虑担忧和皮质厚度之间的关系。次要目标是确定大脑中哪个部位的皮质厚度与焦虑的两个组成部分都显著相关。结果表明，右侧前岛叶与焦虑唤醒的关系更强，而背外侧前额叶皮层和左侧前岛叶与焦虑唤醒和担忧都相关。我们还观察到杏仁核和海马体在焦虑唤醒和焦虑担忧之间存在体积差异。焦虑唤醒可以预测左杏仁核体积，但焦虑担忧不能；而焦虑担忧可以预测右海马体体积，但焦虑唤醒不能。这些发现表明，导致焦虑独立特征的神经区域既有差异也有相似之处。结果是根据情感和发展认知神经科学的先前发现来讨论的。
