K Klepzig, M Domin, B von Sarnowski, A Lischke, M Lotze
Functional Imaging Unit, Institute of Diagnostic Radiology and Neuroradiology, University Medicine Greifswald, Greifswald, Germany.
Department of Neurology, University Medicine Greifswald, Greifswald, Germany.
PLoS One. 2024 Jul 17;19(7):e0301940. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0301940. eCollection 2024.
Insula damage results in substantial impairments in facial emotion recognition. In particular, left hemispheric damage appears to be associated with poorer recognition of aversively rated facial expressions. Functional imaging can provide information on differences in the processing of these stimuli in patients with insula lesions when compared to healthy matched controls (HCs). We therefore investigated 17 patients with insula lesions in the chronic stage following stroke and 13 HCs using a passive-viewing task with pictures of facial expressions testing the blood oxygenation dependent (BOLD) effect in predefined regions of interest (ROIs). We expected a decrease in functional activation in an area modulating emotional response (left ventral striatum) but not in the facial recognition areas in the left inferior fusiform gyrus. Quantification of BOLD-response in ROIs but also voxel-based statistics confirmed this hypothesis. The voxel-based analysis demonstrated that the decrease in BOLD in the left ventral striatum was driven by left hemispheric damaged patients (n = 10). In our patient group, insula activation was strongly associated with the intensity rating of facial expressions. In conclusion, the combination of performance testing and functional imaging in patients following circumscribed brain damage is a challenging method for understanding emotion processing in the human brain.
脑岛损伤会导致面部表情识别能力严重受损。特别是，左半球损伤似乎与对负面表情的识别能力较差有关。与健康对照者（HCs）相比，功能成像可以提供有关脑岛病变患者对这些刺激处理差异的信息。因此，我们使用面部表情图片的被动观看任务，对17例中风后慢性期脑岛病变患者和13例HCs进行了研究，测试了预定义感兴趣区域（ROIs）中的血氧依赖（BOLD）效应。我们预计调节情绪反应的区域（左腹侧纹状体）功能激活会降低，但左下颞叶梭状回的面部识别区域不会降低。对ROIs中BOLD反应的量化以及基于体素的统计证实了这一假设。基于体素的分析表明，左腹侧纹状体BOLD的降低是由左半球受损患者（n = 10）驱动的。在我们的患者组中，脑岛激活与面部表情的强度评分密切相关。总之，对局限性脑损伤患者进行性能测试和功能成像相结合，是理解人类大脑情绪处理的一种具有挑战性的方法。
