Neuropsychology and Functional Neuroimaging Research Group (UR2NF) at the Centre for Research in Cognition and Neurosciences (CRCN), Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Brussels, Belgium.
Hôpital Universitaire Robert Debré, Paris, France.
Transl Psychiatry. 2020 Jan 22;10(1):24. doi: 10.1038/s41398-020-0707-z.
Attention-deficit/hyperactivity (ADHD) and autism spectrum (ASD) disorders often co-occur. In both cases, response inhibition deficits and inhibition-related atypical brain activation have been reported, although less consistently in ASD. Research exploring the overlap/distinctiveness between ADHD and ASD has significantly increased in recent years, but direct comparison of the inhibition-related neuronal correlates between these disorders are scarce in the literature. This study aimed at disentangling the shared and specific inhibitory brain dysfunctions in ASD and ADHD. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), brain activity was compared between children with ADHD, ASD and typically developing (TD) children aged 8-12 years during an inhibition stop-signal task, using stringent inclusion criteria. At the behavioural level, only children with ADHD exhibited inhibition deficits when compared with the TD group. Distinct patterns of brain activity were observed during successful inhibition. In children with ADHD, motor inhibition was associated with right inferior parietal activation, whereas right frontal regions were activated in children with ASD. Between-group comparisons disclosed higher middle frontal activation in the ASD group compared with the ADHD and the TD groups. Our results evidence different patterns of activation during inhibition in these two disorders, recruiting different regions of the fronto-parietal network associated to inhibition. Besides brain activity differences, behavioural inhibition deficits found only in children with ADHD further suggest that reactive inhibition is one of the core deficits in ADHD, but not in ASD. Our findings provide further evidence contributing to disentangle the shared and specific inhibitory dysfunctions in ASD and ADHD.
注意缺陷多动障碍（ADHD）和自闭症谱系障碍（ASD）常同时发生。在这两种情况下，都有报道称存在反应抑制缺陷和与抑制相关的异常大脑激活，尽管在 ASD 中报道得较少。近年来，探索 ADHD 和 ASD 之间重叠/独特性的研究显著增加，但在文献中，直接比较这两种疾病之间与抑制相关的神经元相关性的研究却很少。本研究旨在阐明 ASD 和 ADHD 之间共享和特定的抑制性脑功能障碍。使用功能磁共振成像（fMRI），我们在抑制停止信号任务中比较了 8-12 岁患有 ADHD、ASD 和典型发育（TD）儿童的大脑活动，使用了严格的纳入标准。在行为水平上，只有 ADHD 儿童与 TD 组相比表现出抑制缺陷。在成功抑制期间观察到不同的大脑活动模式。在 ADHD 儿童中，运动抑制与右顶下小叶激活有关，而 ASD 儿童的右额区被激活。组间比较显示，与 ADHD 和 TD 组相比，ASD 组的中额前区激活更高。我们的结果表明，在这两种疾病中，在抑制期间存在不同的激活模式，涉及与抑制相关的额顶网络的不同区域。除了大脑活动差异外，仅在 ADHD 儿童中发现的行为抑制缺陷进一步表明，反应性抑制是 ADHD 的核心缺陷之一，但不是 ASD 的核心缺陷。我们的发现提供了进一步的证据，有助于阐明 ASD 和 ADHD 之间共享和特定的抑制功能障碍。
