Department of Neuroscience, The Del Monte Institute for Neuroscience, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Rochester, NY, USA.
School of Psychological Sciences, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv, Israel.
Psychol Med. 2023 Jul;53(10):4666-4674. doi: 10.1017/S003329172200157X. Epub 2022 Jun 2.
In a recent eye-tracking study we found a differential dwell time pattern for negatively-valenced and neutral faces among patients with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), trauma-exposed healthy control (TEHCs), and healthy control (HC) participants. Here, we explored whether these group differences relate to resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) patterns of brain areas previously linked to both attention processes and PTSD. These encompass the amygdala, dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC), ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (vlPFC), and nucleus accumbens (NAcc).
Ten minutes magnetic resonance imaging rsFC scans were recorded in 17 PTSD patients, 21 TEHCs, and 16 HCs. Participants then completed a free-viewing eye-tracking task assessing attention allocation outside the scanner. Dwell time on negatively-valenced stimuli (DT%) were assessed relative to functional connectivity in the aforementioned seed regions of interest (amygdala, dACC, dlPFC, vlPFC, and NAcc) to whole-brain voxel-wise rsFC.
As previously reported, group differences occurred in attention allocation to negative-valence stimuli, with longer dwell time on negatively valence stimuli in the PTSD and TEHC groups than the HC group. Higher DT% correlated with weaker NAcc-orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) connectivity in patients with PTSD. Conversely, a positive association emerged in the HC group between DT% and NAcc-OFC connectivity.
While exploratory in nature, present findings may suggest that reward-related brain areas are involved in disengaging attention from negative-valenced stimuli, and possibly in regulating ensuing negative emotions.
在最近的一项眼动追踪研究中，我们发现创伤后应激障碍（PTSD）患者、创伤暴露健康对照组（TEHC）和健康对照组（HC）的负性和中性面孔的注视时间存在差异。在这里，我们探讨了这些组间差异是否与先前与注意力过程和 PTSD 均相关的大脑区域的静息态功能连接（rsFC）模式有关。这些区域包括杏仁核、背侧前扣带皮层（dACC）、背外侧前额叶皮层（dlPFC）、腹外侧前额叶皮层（vlPFC）和伏隔核（NAcc）。
17 名 PTSD 患者、21 名 TEHC 和 16 名 HC 完成了 10 分钟的磁共振成像 rsFC 扫描。然后，参与者在扫描室外完成了一项自由观看眼动追踪任务，评估注意力分配。相对于上述种子感兴趣区（杏仁核、dACC、dlPFC、vlPFC 和 NAcc）的功能连接，评估负性刺激的注视时间（DT%）。对全脑体素进行 rsFC。
如前所述，在对负性效价刺激的注意力分配方面存在组间差异，PTSD 和 TEHC 组的注视时间长于 HC 组。较高的 DT%与 PTSD 患者的 NAcc-眶额皮层（OFC）连接较弱相关。相反，在 HC 组中，DT%与 NAcc-OFC 连接之间存在正相关。
虽然本研究为探索性研究，但目前的研究结果可能表明，与奖励相关的大脑区域参与了从负性效价刺激中转移注意力，并可能参与了调节随后的负面情绪。
