Test-retest reliability of emotion regulation networks using fMRI at ultra-high magnetic field

Christian Windischberger,Stella Berboth,Nils Kohn,Carmen Morawetz

doi:10.1016/j.neuroimage.2021.117917

Abstract

Given the importance of emotion regulation in affective disorders, emotion regulation is at the focus of attempts to identify brain biomarkers of disease risk, treatment response, and brain development. However, to be useful as an indicator for individual characteristics of brain functions – particularly as a biomarker in a clinical context – ensuring reliability is a key challenge. Here, we systematically evaluated test-retest reliability of task-based functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) activity within neural networks associated with emotion generation and regulation across three sessions. Acquiring fMRI data at ultra-high field (7T), we examined region- and voxel-wise test-retest reliability of brain activity in response to a well-established emotion regulation task for predefined region-of-interests (ROIs) implicated in four neural networks. Test-retest reliability varied considerably across the emotion regulation networks and respective ROIs. However, core emotion regulation regions, including the ventrolateral and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (vlPFC and dlPFC) as well as the middle temporal gyrus (MTG) showed high reliability. Our findings thus support the role of these prefrontal and temporal regions as promising candidates for the study of individual differences in emotion regulation as well as for neurobiological biomarkers in clinical neuroscience research.

Highlights

The ability to regulate our emotions by means of flexibly responding to affective events in a context-dependent manner is of great importance for our mental and physical health (Berking and Wupperman, 2012; Eftekhari et al, 2009) as well as for successful social interactions (Gross and John, 2003)
To determine the reliability of the emotion regulation task on a neural level we conducted region-wise and voxel-wise intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs) analyses using the four predefined networks shown to be involved in emotion generation and regulation
We examined for the first time the test-retest reliability of brain activity during the cognitive control of emotions using reappraisal and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)

Summary

Introduction

The ability to regulate our emotions by means of flexibly responding to affective events in a context-dependent manner is of great importance for our mental and physical health (Berking and Wupperman, 2012; Eftekhari et al, 2009) as well as for successful social interactions (Gross and John, 2003). The role of emotion regulation in the development and maintenance of psychopathologies has been addressed by a growing number of studies, highlighting the importance of emotion dysregulation across psychological disorders (Cludius et al, 2020). Along with the view of emotion regulation as a transdiagnostic construct, understanding the neural mechanisms that underlie the regulation of emotions has become an important topic in affective neuroscience. This is further emphasized in light of the growing interest in finding neurobiological biomarkers of disease development and treatment response (Insel et al, 2010; Woo et al, 2017). Based on several meta-analyses in the field, a well-established and robust network of brain regions has been associated with emotion regulation (e.g., Buhle et al, 2014; Kohn et al, 2014; Morawetz et al, 2020; Ochsner et al, 2012) that consists of frontal (dorsolateral and ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, dlPFC and vlPFC), temporal (superior and middle temporal gyrus, STG and MTG), parietal (inferior and superior parietal lobe) as well as subcortical regions (amygdala, striatum) and the insula

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion