Chang Li-Ang, Engelmann Jan B
Center for Research in Experimental Economics and political Decision Making (CREED), Amsterdam School of Economics, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Behavioral Economics, The Tinbergen Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Imaging Neurosci (Camb). 2024 Feb 22;2. doi: 10.1162/imag_a_00096. eCollection 2024.
While the effects of anxiety on various cognitive processes, including memory, attention, and learning, have been relatively well documented, the neurobiological effects of anxiety on social cognitive processes remain largely unknown. We address this gap using threat-of-shock to induce incidental anxiety while participants performed two false-belief tasks, a standard and an economic-games version. During belief formation and belief inferences, regions in a canonical social cognition network showed activation reflecting mentalizing, including the temporoparietal junction (TPJ), precuneus, and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC). At the same time, we found threat-related suppression of social cognition regions during belief inferences. A conjunction analysis confirmed that a network of regions was simultaneously engaged during mentalizing and suppressed by anxiety: bilateral TPJ, bilateral inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), and putamen. We examined how threat impacted the connectivity between these seed regions and its targets. During belief formation, we found that threat suppressed the connectivity between the precuneus and two key mentalizing nodes, the dmPFC and right TPJ. Moreover, during belief inferences, threat specifically suppressed belief-based connectivity between putamen and its targets in intraparietal sulcus (IPS) and dlPFC. Dispositional distress significantly modulated threat-related suppression of connectivity between the left TPJ and left IPS. Our results indicate that social cognitive processes rely on support from other large-scale networks, such as the reward and attentional systems, and that these network interactions are disrupted under incidental and dispositional anxiety.
虽然焦虑对包括记忆、注意力和学习在内的各种认知过程的影响已有较为充分的记录，但焦虑对社会认知过程的神经生物学影响仍 largely unknown。我们通过电击威胁诱导附带焦虑，让参与者完成两项错误信念任务，一个是标准版本，另一个是经济游戏版本，以填补这一空白。在信念形成和信念推理过程中，一个典型的社会认知网络中的区域显示出反映心理化的激活，包括颞顶联合区（TPJ）、楔前叶和背内侧前额叶皮质（dmPFC）。与此同时，我们发现在信念推理过程中，社会认知区域受到与威胁相关的抑制。一项联合分析证实，一个区域网络在心理化过程中同时被激活，并受到焦虑的抑制：双侧TPJ、双侧额下回（IFG）和壳核。我们研究了威胁如何影响这些种子区域与其目标之间的连接性。在信念形成过程中，我们发现威胁抑制了楔前叶与两个关键心理化节点dmPFC和右侧TPJ之间的连接性。此外，在信念推理过程中，威胁特别抑制了壳核与其在顶内沟（IPS）和背外侧前额叶皮质（dlPFC）中的目标之间基于信念的连接性。特质性痛苦显著调节了左侧TPJ与左侧IPS之间与威胁相关的连接性抑制。我们的结果表明，社会认知过程依赖于其他大规模网络（如奖励和注意力系统）的支持，并且这些网络相互作用在附带焦虑和特质性焦虑下会受到干扰。
