Nenadić Igor, Lorenz Carsten, Gaser Christian
Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Philipps Universität Marburg, Rudolf-Bultmann-Str. 8, 35039, Marburg, Germany.
Department of Psychology, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, Frankfurt, Germany.
Sci Rep. 2021 Aug 3;11(1):15707. doi: 10.1038/s41598-021-94920-z.
Narcissistic traits have been linked to structural and functional brain networks, including the insular cortex, however, with inconsistent findings. In this study, we tested the hypothesis that subclinical narcissism is associated with variations in regional brain volumes in insular and prefrontal areas. We studied 103 clinically healthy subjects, who were assessed for narcissistic traits using the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI, 40-item version) and received high-resolution structural magnetic resonance imaging. Voxel-based morphometry was used to analyse MRI scans and multiple regression models were used for statistical analysis, with threshold-free cluster enhancement (TFCE). We found significant (p < 0.05, family-wise error FWE corrected) positive correlations of NPI scores with grey matter in multiple prefrontal cortical areas (including the medial and ventromedial, anterior/rostral dorsolateral prefrontal and orbitofrontal cortices, subgenual and mid-anterior cingulate cortices, insula, and bilateral caudate nuclei). We did not observe reliable links to particular facets of NPI-narcissism. Our findings provide novel evidence for an association of narcissistic traits with variations in prefrontal and insular brain structure, which also overlap with previous functional studies of narcissism-related phenotypes including self-enhancement and social dominance. However, further studies are needed to clarify differential associations to entitlement vs. vulnerable facets of narcissism.
自恋特质已被证明与包括脑岛皮质在内的大脑结构和功能网络有关，然而，研究结果并不一致。在本研究中，我们检验了一个假设，即亚临床自恋与脑岛和前额叶区域的局部脑容量变化有关。我们研究了103名临床健康受试者，使用自恋人格问卷（NPI，40项版本）对他们的自恋特质进行评估，并对他们进行了高分辨率结构磁共振成像检查。基于体素的形态学测量用于分析MRI扫描结果，多元回归模型用于统计分析，并采用无阈值聚类增强（TFCE）方法。我们发现NPI得分与多个前额叶皮质区域（包括内侧和腹内侧、前/喙背外侧前额叶和眶额皮质、膝下和中前扣带回皮质、脑岛以及双侧尾状核）的灰质存在显著正相关（p < 0.05，经家族性错误率FWE校正）。我们没有观察到与NPI自恋特定方面的可靠联系。我们的研究结果为自恋特质与前额叶和脑岛脑结构变化之间的关联提供了新的证据，这也与之前关于自恋相关表型（包括自我增强和社会支配）的功能研究结果相重叠。然而，需要进一步的研究来阐明自恋的特权方面与脆弱方面的差异关联。
