Abstract
IntroductionTracking stress‐induced brain activity and connectivity dynamically and examining activity/connectivity‐associated recovery ability after stress might be an effective way of detecting stress vulnerability.MethodsUsing two widely used stress paradigms, a speech task (social stress) and a mathematical calculation task (mental loading stress), we examined common changes in regional homogeneity (ReHo) and functional connectivity (FC) before, during, and after the two stressful tasks in thirty‐nine college students. A counting breath relaxation task was employed as a contrast task. ReHo and FC were compared between subjects with higher versus lower depression symptoms (assessed by the Beck Depression Inventory, BDI). We developed a recovery index (RI) based on dynamic changes of ReHo/FC to evaluate individuals' ability to recover from a stressful state. To assess RI's usefulness in predicting future depression severity, BDI was also measured at one‐year follow‐up.ResultsOur results revealed a ReHo decrease after both stressful tasks and a ReHo increase after the relaxation task in bilateral thalamus. The ReHo decrease after both stressful tasks was more significant in the higher BDI than the lower BDI group. Higher ReHo RI of the right thalamus in the higher BDI groups was significantly correlated with lower BDI severity at one‐year follow‐up. Bilateral thalamus also showed increased FC with the default mode network and decreased FC with the executive control network after the stressful tasks.ConclusionThese findings highlight the importance of tracking resting activity and connectivity of thalamus dynamically for detecting stress vulnerability.
Highlights
Tracking stress‐induced brain activity and connectivity dynamically and examining activity/connectivity‐associated recovery ability after stress might be an effective way of detecting stress vulnerability
For the lower Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) group, higher recovery index (RI) was correlated with higher BDI (speech: r(12) = 0.41, p = .04; math: r(12) = 0.44, p = .03), while for the higher BDI group, higher RI was correlated with lower BDI at one‐year follow‐up (speech: r(23) = −0.55, p = .04; math: r(23) = −0.59, p = .03), and no correla‐ tion was found for the relaxation task
We focused on identifying common changes induced by the two stressful tasks and examined whether higher versus lower depression symptom severity groups differed in the recovery of stress‐induced changes over time
Summary
Stress vulnerability models (Monroe & Simons, 1991) suggest that most individuals, when confronted with daily life stressors, can cope with them efficiently and that they quickly refocus thoughts away from the stress experiences (Robbins, 2005). The current study had two main goals: to explore the shared neuropathways in response to different stressors to confirm the core neural systems related to acute stress; and to develop a quan‐ titative measure to evaluate individuals' ability to recover from stress and to test the hypothesis that the recovery ability could predict future depression severity. To this end, we conducted three fMRI sessions with two stressful tasks (speech task and math calculation task to induce social stress and mental loading stress respectively) and one relaxation task (breath counting).
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