Abstract
Background: Previous studies have indicated the resting-state default mode network (DMN) related connectivity serving as predictor of sustained attention performance in healthy people. Interestingly, sustained attention deficits as well as DMN-involved functional connectivity (FC) alterations are common in both patients with schizophrenia (SCZ) and with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Thus, the present study was designed to investigate whether the DMN related resting-state connectivity alterations in these two psychiatric disorders were neural correlates of their sustained attention impairments.Methods: The study included 17 SCZ patients, 35 OCD patients and 36 healthy controls (HCs). Sustained attention to response task was adopted to assess the sustained attention. Resting-state scan was administrated and seed-based whole-brain FC analyses were performed with seeds located in classical DMN regions including bilateral medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) and posterior cingulate cortex (PCC).Results: Both SCZ and OCD patients had poorer sustained attention than HCs. Sustained attention deficits in OCD was negatively correlated with their impaired FC of right mPFC-left superior frontal gyrus (SFG) within DMN, and that in SCZ was significantly correlated with their altered FC of left mPFC-bilateral anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) which indicated interaction between DMN and salience network. In addition, the FC between left mPFC and right parietal lobe indicating the interaction between DMN and frontal-parietal network was correlated with sustained attention in both SCZ and OCD.Conclusion: These findings suggest the importance of DMN-involved connectivity, both within and between networks in underlying sustained attention deficits in OCD and SCZ. Results further support the potential of resting-state FC in complementing information for cognitive deficits in psychiatric disorders.
Highlights
Sustaining a moderate level of attention is essential for the performance of many everyday activities
Main results were: (1) both SCZ and obsessive-compulsive disorders (OCD) patients had enhanced individual variability (IIV) during sustained attention to response task (SART) which indicated their poorer sustained attention; (2) reduced resting-state functional connectivity (FC) of right medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC)-left superior frontal gyrus (SFG) was significantly correlated with sustained attention deficits in OCD; (3) reduced FC between left mPFC and bilateral anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) was significantly associated with sustained attention dysfunction in SCZ; and (4) the FC between left mPFC and right parietal lobe was significantly correlated with sustained attention in both OCD and SCZ
anterior insula (AI) may play a more prominent role in receiving and integrating information and while the dACC may be more closely tied to modulating and controlling responses in sensory, motor, and association cortices (Menon and Uddin, 2010). These might raise the possibility that the reduced connectivity between ACC and mPFC in SCZ indicated the inefficient control of salience network (SN) over default mode network (DMN) which were reflected on the improper DMN activity level in SCZ
Summary
Sustaining a moderate level of attention is essential for the performance of many everyday activities. Several previous studies have revealed the overlapping structural and functional brain dysfunction in SCZ and OCD, indicating the somewhat shared pathomechanisms across these two psychiatric conditions (Tibbo and Warneke, 1999; GrossIsseroff et al, 2003). Based on these links between SCZ and OCD, it may be of great interest to explore some common cognitive deficits in these two disorders, in terms of which, for example, the sustained attention impairments. Sustained attention deficits as well as DMN-involved functional connectivity (FC) alterations are common in both patients with schizophrenia (SCZ) and with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). The present study was designed to investigate whether the DMN related resting-state connectivity alterations in these two psychiatric disorders were neural correlates of their sustained attention impairments
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