Negative Cues Research Articles

Examining Prefrontal Cortex Activity and Tonic Anxiety in Alcohol Use Disorder Recovery: A Functional Near Infrared Spectroscopy Study

ABSTRACTCognitive impairment, emotional reactivity, and circuitry differences have been examined for anxiety using functional magnetic resonance imaging, positron emission tomography, and near infrared spectroscopy, with no overwhelming consensus as to the impacted brain regions. In the present study, 32 participants in recovery from alcohol use disorder were administered the Penn State Worry Questionnaire to assess tonic anxiety level and viewed aversive images during functional near infrared spectroscopy (fNIR) prefrontal cortex (PFC) assessment. Negative cue examination revealed a positive association between anxiety level and left dorsolateral and dorsomedial PFC activation. Previous alcoholism research demonstrates potential confounds in these dorsolateral and dorsomedial regions, limiting generalizations to addiction-naïve populations. However, fNIR presently showed reliability as an imaging technique for assessing anxiety-related PFC activity that could augment standard diagnostic procedures for anxiety disorders. In addition, this type of research could impact understanding of comorbidity in alcohol use disorder treatment and recovery.

Autobiographical Memory in Bipolar Disorder and Its Link to Neuropsychological Functioning

Objective: The aim of this study was to examine the specificity of autobiographical memory (AM) in bipolar disorder (BD) and to investigate the association between AM and neuropsychological functions. Method: Twenty bipolar patients and 22 matched healthy controls (HCs) were included in this study. AM was assessed with an extended version of the Autobiographical Memory Test (AMT) including rejection cue words. A neuropsychological test battery was used to examine verbal memory, executive functions, and attention. Results: Across both groups, the number of specific memories in the AMT was significantly smaller in response to rejection cue words and positive cue words than in response to negative cue words. Participants with BD and HCs did not differ significantly in neuropsychological measures. Across both groups, scores of verbal memory, executive functions, and attention were significantly correlated with specificity of retrieved memories. Limitations: Although our clinical sample consisted of clinically stable outpatients, 6 out of 20 patients were not rated as euthymic but as mildly depressed. All BD patients were medicated. Conclusion: Contrary to previous results, patients with BD did not differ in the number of specific memories compared to an HC group. Our findings suggest that neuropsychological functioning is associated with AMT specificity. Further research is required to gain a better understanding of the underlying mechanisms which may influence the ease of memory retrieval.

Uncertainty increases neural indices of attention in obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) experience abnormally high levels of uncertainty, and unpredictability is evaluated negatively and not well tolerated. The current study examined neural correlates of attentional processing in response to experimentally induced uncertainty in OCD. Twenty-four OCD patients and 24 healthy controls performed a task where neutral and negative pictures were preceded by a cue, either being predictive (certain condition) or nonpredictive (uncertain condition) of subsequent picture valence. We examined prepicture anticipatory attention through α (∼8-12 Hz) suppression, and attentional allocation during picture presentation with the P1, N1, P2, N2, and late positive potential (LPP) of the event-related potential. Additionally, we tested how clinical measures related to these attentional markers. Subjectively, patients overestimated the frequency of negative pictures after nonpredictive cues. Patients, but not controls, showed upper α(10-12 Hz) suppression after nonpredictive and predictive negative cues relative to predictive neutral cues. Only patients showed increased P2 and decreased N2 amplitudes for pictures after nonpredictive cues, and, whereas both groups showed increased LPP amplitudes for pictures after nonpredictive cues, this modulation was more pronounced in OCD during the early LPP (<1,000 ms). In patients, P2 and LPP amplitudes for negative pictures were associated positively with anxiety and negatively with depression. These results suggest that OCD patients process anticipation of inevitable and potential threat similarly and highlight the substantial motivational impact of uncertain events to OCD patients. Finally, the correlation with anxiety implies that anxiety represents the source of hypervigilance during uncertainty resolution.

Patients with bulimia nervosa do not show typical neurodevelopment of cognitive control under emotional influences

Bulimia nervosa (BN) emerges in the late teen years and is characterized by binge eating and related compensatory behaviors. These behaviors often co-occur with periods of negative affect suggesting an association between emotions and control over eating behavior. In the current study, we examined how cognitive control and neural processes change under emotional states of arousal in 46 participants with (n=19) and without (n=27) BN from the ages of 18–33 years. Participants performed a go/nogo task consisting of brief negative, positive and neutral emotional cues and sustained negative, positive and neutral emotional states of arousal during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Overall task performance improved with age for healthy participants, but not for patients with BN. These age-dependent behavioral effects were paralleled by diminished recruitment of prefrontal control circuitry in patients with BN with age. Although patients with BN showed no difference in performance on the experimental manipulations of negative emotions, sustained positive emotions related to improved performance among patients with BN. Together the findings highlight a neurodevelopmental approach towards understanding markers of psychopathology and suggest that sustained positive affect may have potential therapeutic effects on maintaining behavioral control in BN.

Emotional self-other voice processing in schizophrenia and its relationship with hallucinations: ERP evidence.

Abnormalities in self-other voice processing have been observed in schizophrenia, and may underlie the experience of hallucinations. More recent studies demonstrated that these impairments are enhanced for speech stimuli with negative content. Nonetheless, few studies probed the temporal dynamics of self versus nonself speech processing in schizophrenia and, particularly, the impact of semantic valence on self-other voice discrimination. In the current study, we examined these questions, and additionally probed whether impairments in these processes are associated with the experience of hallucinations. Fifteen schizophrenia patients and 16 healthy controls listened to 420 prerecorded adjectives differing in voice identity (self-generated [SGS] versus nonself speech [NSS]) and semantic valence (neutral, positive, and negative), while EEG data were recorded. The N1, P2, and late positive potential (LPP) ERP components were analyzed. ERP results revealed group differences in the interaction between voice identity and valence in the P2 and LPP components. Specifically, LPP amplitude was reduced in patients compared with healthy subjects for SGS and NSS with negative content. Further, auditory hallucinations severity was significantly predicted by LPP amplitude: the higher the SAPS "voices conversing" score, the larger the difference in LPP amplitude between negative and positive NSS. The absence of group differences in the N1 suggests that self-other voice processing abnormalities in schizophrenia are not primarily driven by disrupted sensory processing of voice acoustic information. The association between LPP amplitude and hallucination severity suggests that auditory hallucinations are associated with enhanced sustained attention to negative cues conveyed by a nonself voice.

Reduced specificity and enhanced subjective experience of future thinking in ageing: the influence of avoidance and emotion-regulation strategies

ABSTRACTFuture thinking in older adults is characterised by a lack of specificity of imagined events and by an equal or even higher subjective experience, compared to younger adults. We considered whether this lack of specificity stemmed partly from the avoidance of a somewhat disturbing future and then examined the extent to which certain types of emotion-regulation strategies, namely positive reappraisal and positive refocusing, contributed to the subjective experience of future thinking. Middle-aged and older adults completed an adapted version of the AMT, in which temporal distance and cue word valence were manipulated, thus resulting in future conditions assumed to represent varying degrees of discomfort. Results indicate that distant future and negative cues restricted both the specificity and the subjective experience of future thinking. In addition, the use of avoidance strategies predicted the nature of future thoughts in the context of a supposed uncomfortable future (i.e., a distant future induced by negative cues), although it followed quite different age-related patterns. Together with the findings that positive reappraisal and positive refocusing (to a lesser extent) contributed to the subjective experience of future thinking, this study indicates that how individuals imagine their personal future also relies on affect- and emotion-regulation strategies.

Neural responses to alcohol and negative cues in heavy drinkers and relationships with AUD severity

Neural responses to alcohol and negative cues in heavy drinkers and relationships with AUD severity

Functional neuroimaging of sex differences in autobiographical memory recall in depression.

Females are more likely than males to develop major depressive disorder (MDD). The current study used fMRI to compare the neural correlates of autobiographical memory (AM) recall between males and females diagnosed with MDD. AM overgenerality is a persistent cognitive deficit in MDD, the magnitude of which is correlated with depressive severity only in females. Delineating the neurobiological correlates of this deficit may elucidate the nature of sex-differences in the diathesis for developing MDD. Participants included unmedicated males and females diagnosed with MDD (n = 20/group), and an age and sex matched healthy control group. AM recall in response to positive, negative, and neutral cue words was compared with a semantic memory task. The behavioral properties of AMs did not differ between MDD males and females. In contrast, main effects of sex on cerebral hemodynamic activity were observed in left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and parahippocampal gyrus during recall of positive specific memories, and middle prefrontal cortex (mPFC), and precuneus during recall of negative specific memories. Moreover, main effects of diagnosis on regional hemodynamic activity were observed in left ventrolateral prefrontal cortex and mPFC during positive specific memory recall, and dorsal anterior cingulate cortex during negative specific memory recall. Sex × diagnosis interactions were evident in the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, caudate, and precuneus during positive memory recall, and in the posterior cingulate cortex, insula, precuneus and thalamus during negative specific memory recall. The differential hemodynamic changes conceivably may reflect sex-specific cognitive strategies during recall of AMs irrespective of the phenomenological properties of those memories.

SNPPhenA: a corpus for extracting ranked associations of single-nucleotide polymorphisms and phenotypes from literature

BackgroundSingle Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNPs) are among the most important types of genetic variations influencing common diseases and phenotypes. Recently, some corpora and methods have been developed with the purpose of extracting mutations and diseases from texts. However, there is no available corpus, for extracting associations from texts, that is annotated with linguistic-based negation, modality markers, neutral candidates, and confidence level of associations.MethodIn this research, different steps were presented so as to produce the SNPPhenA corpus. They include automatic Named Entity Recognition (NER) followed by the manual annotation of SNP and phenotype names, annotation of the SNP-phenotype associations and their level of confidence, as well as modality markers. Moreover, the produced corpus was annotated with negation scopes and cues as well as neutral candidates that play crucial role as far as negation and the modality phenomenon in relation to extraction tasks.ResultThe agreement between annotators was measured by Cohen’s Kappa coefficient where the resulting scores indicated the reliability of the corpus. The Kappa score was 0.79 for annotating the associations and 0.80 for the confidence degree of associations. Further presented were the basic statistics of the annotated features of the corpus in addition to the results of our first experiments related to the extraction of ranked SNP-Phenotype associations. The prepared guideline documents render the corpus more convenient and facile to use. The corpus, guidelines and inter-annotator agreement analysis are available on the website of the corpus: http://nil.fdi.ucm.es/?q=node/639.ConclusionSpecifying the confidence degree of SNP-phenotype associations from articles helps identify the strength of associations that could in turn assist genomics scientists in determining phenotypic plasticity and the importance of environmental factors. What is more, our first experiments with the corpus show that linguistic-based confidence alongside other non-linguistic features can be utilized in order to estimate the strength of the observed SNP-phenotype associations. Trial Registration: Not Applicable

Resting state and personality component (BIS/BAS) predict the brain activity (EEG and fNIRS measure) in response to emotional cues.

IntroductionThe present study explored the role of resting state and personality component (BIS/BAS measure) on prefrontal cortical responsiveness to emotional cues. Indeed, we supposed that lateralized resting activity (right vs. left) and approach (BAS) versus avoidance (BIS) attitude may explain the successive emotional processing within the prefrontal cortex (PFC) based on the stimulus valence (positive and negative emotional cues).MethodsHemodynamic (functional near‐infrared spectroscopy, fNIRS) and electroencephalographic (EEG) measures were considered. The resting and experimental brain activity were registered when subjects (N = 21) viewed emotional positive versus negative stimuli (International Affective Picture System, IAPS). LIR eeg and LIR nirs (lateralized Index Response) during resting state, and LI eeg and LI nirs during emotional processing were acquired.ResultsA set of regression analyses was applied to the multiple measures. The predictive effect of resting activity and approach/avoidance dichotomy were elucidated. Indeed, more left/right resting activity (for both LIR eeg and LIR nirs) predicted the successive more brain left/right response (LI eeg and LI nirs) to emotional cues. Second, significant effects were revealed as a function of valence (increased right response to negative stimuli; increased left response to positive stimuli) during emotion processing. Third, higher BAS values explained an increased left cortical activity in resting state and in experimental condition for positive cues. In contrast, higher BIS values marked an increased right activity in resting state and in experimental condition in response to negative cues.ConclusionThe significance of trait component for both resting and emotional cue processing was discussed at light of the present results.

Positive and negative cues for modulating neurite dynamics and receptor expression

Many current peripheral nerve repair strategies focus on delivering positive, growth promoting cues (e.g. extracellular matrix, ECM) while eliminating negative, growth inhibiting cues (e.g. chondroitin sulfate proteoglycans, CSPGs) at the injury site. We hypothesized that recapitulating the positive and negative cues of the peripheral nerve injury microenvironment would improve regeneration. First, we tested the effects of a characteristic CSPG, chondroitin sulfate A (CSA) on neurite dynamics of dissociated chick embryo dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons using time lapse video microscopy. DRG growth was recorded on different adhesive substrates, including a novel, porcine-derived spinal cord matrix (SCM). The SCM significantly increased frequency of neurite extension coordinated by a significant reduction in the neurites’ time spent stalled. The SCM also mitigated inhibitory effects of CSA, producing longer neurites than the controls without CSA treatment. Next we aimed to elucidate receptors involved in mediating this behavior by testing the ability of CSA to upregulate cell–substrate binding receptors using flow cytometry. Our results showed a significant increase in syndecan-3 receptor expression in neurons treated with CSA. Furthermore, syndecans would most likely bind to the sulfated glycosaminoglycans measured in the SCM. Finally, we evaluated neurite growth on biomaterial scaffolds featuring CSA and SCM cues. Our results showed significantly increased neurite outgrowth on electrospun hyaluronic acid fibers with SCM and low levels of CSA. Higher incorporation of CSA maintained its inhibitory properties. Future work will evaluate coupling CSPGs with growth-permissive ECM to assess the combined effect on neurite outgrowth.

Cortical evidence for negative search templates

ABSTRACTA “target template”, specifying target features, is thought to benefit visual search performance. Setting up a “negative template”, specifying distractor features, should improve distractor inhibition and also benefit target detection. In the current fMRI study, subjects were required to search for a target among distractors enclosed in coloured circles. Before search, one of three colour cues appeared: a positive cue indicating the target will appear in the same colour, a negative cue indicating only distractors will appear in the same colour, or a neutral cue indicating that the same colour will not appear in the search display. fMRI results revealed down-regulation of neural processing in large parts of visual cortex following negative compared to positive cues. We further found a general attention inhibition mechanism in SPL/precuneus for neutral cues compared to positive and negative cues. These results suggest a cortical distinction between target templates, negative templates, and task-irrelevant distractor inhibition.

Memory effects of sleep, emotional valence, arousal and novelty in children.

Effectiveness of memory consolidation is determined by multiple factors, including sleep after learning, emotional valence, arousal and novelty. Few studies investigated how the effect of sleep compares with (and interacts with) these other factors, of which virtually none are in children. The present study did so by repeated assessment of declarative memory in 386 children (45% boys) aged 9-11years through an online word-pair task. Children were randomly assigned to either a morning or evening learning session of 30 unrelated word-pairs with positive, neutral or negative valenced cues and neutral targets. After immediately assessing baseline recognition, delayed recognition was recorded either 12 or 24h later, resulting in four different assessment schedules. One week later, the procedure was repeated with exactly the same word-pairs to evaluate whether effects differed for relearning versus original novel learning. Mixed-effect logistic regression models were used to evaluate how the probability of correct recognition was affected by sleep, valence, arousal, novelty and their interactions. Both immediate and delayed recognition were worse for pairs with negatively valenced or less arousing cue words. Relearning improved immediate and delayed word-pair recognition. In contrast to these effects, sleep did not affect recognition, nor did sleep moderate the effects of arousal, valence and novelty. The findings suggest a robust inclination of children to specifically forget the pairing of words to negatively valenced cue words. In agreement with a recent meta-analysis, children seem to depend less on sleep for the consolidation of information than has been reported for adults, irrespective of the emotional valence, arousal and novelty of word-pairs.

Hope, coping skills, and the prefrontal cortex in alcohol use disorder recovery

ABSTRACTBackground: Alcohol use disorders adversely affect individual and societal health. These disorders are a chronic brain disease, and protective factors against relapse should be studied. Prefrontal cortex (PFC) dysfunction is evident in alcohol use disorders, and research that explores recovery of the PFC in alcohol use disorders is needed, specifically in regard to how psychological and behavioral factors can augment medicalized treatments and protect against relapse. For example, hope or a belief that recovery is possible is an important cognitive construct—thought to precede behavioral action—that has been associated with relapse. Objectives: In this study, associations between healthy coping skills and hope (psychological/behavioral factors) and PFC regional activation in response to alcohol cue exposure were examined. It was also examined whether such associations were unique to alcohol cues. Methods: Forty-two participants, 32 males and nine females in recovery from an alcohol use disorder (AUD), were administered a subjective hope and coping in recovery measure. They also viewed alcohol, positive, negative, and neutral cues during functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIR) PFC assessment. Results: Levels of healthy coping skills positively correlated with activation in the right dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (DMPFC) in response to alcohol cues. This finding was unique to alcohol cues. Conclusion: The association between coping skills and activation of the right DMPFC in response to alcohol cues may reflect greater action restraint and top-down PFC control processing that may protect against relapse.

对婴儿痛苦情绪的母亲敏感性

婴儿的依恋形成于婴儿与养育者的互动过程，敏感的母亲养育对于孩子安全依恋的形成是至关重要的。尤其是对婴儿痛苦情绪的母亲敏感性比非痛苦情绪的更能预测婴儿的安全依恋。本文立足于母亲对婴儿痛苦情绪的情感和认知加工、抑郁症状的母亲对婴儿痛苦线索的反应、母亲回应婴儿痛苦情绪的生物社会模型这三个方面，主要探讨对婴儿痛苦线索的母亲敏感性的特点以及母婴依恋关系。未来研究需要考虑家庭系统中父亲敏感性的补偿性角色以及家庭中的三元关系互动对婴儿安全依恋形成的影响。而且对婴儿痛苦情绪的母亲敏感性差异的神经机制以及母亲的情绪图式对婴儿的安全依恋的影响还需要进一步探讨。 Infant attachment is formed by interaction between caregiver and infant. Sensitive maternal caregiving is the most important premise for infant attachment. In particular, maternal sensitivity to distress is more predictive of infant-mother attachment security than sensitivity to non-distress. The research has outlined three approaches to the studies of maternal sensitivity to infant distress and infant attachment, including: maternal emotion and cognitive progressing of infant’s negative emotion cues, mother with postnatal depressive symptoms response to infant distress, and biosocial models of maternal response to infant’s distress. According to the Family Systems Model, investigation into paternal sensitivity to infant distress when maternal sensitivity is absent will provide further insight into children attachment relations. What’s more, it is necessary to further explore that how maternal emotion schema affects infant attachment secure. Finally, future research should further study that how maternal physiological regulation in infant distress mediates the link between maternal sensitivity and attachment.

Vigilance Disorders in Permanent Night Workers: The Case of the Medical Staff

Purpose of the work: To assess the impact of fixed night shift on the vigilance of paramedical staff. Methods: The present study is an exhaustive cross-sectional survey which has been conducted at the University Hospital of Monastir, Tunisia, and it is about 92 care agents working permanently the night. The study of vigilance is based on Epworth scale and Super Lab program. Results: The average age was equal to 42.53 ± 9.45 years with a sex ratio of 1.72. Nurses accounted for 72%. The average score of alertness assessed with Epworth scale was equal to 14.5 ± 6. The use of the Super Lab software has objectified a tendency towards the increase in the average time of reaction of accomplishment of the simple task and the positive cueing task, which was evaluated while starting the shift, during the half time of the work and at the end of the shift. In addition, the average rate of errors evaluated at the beginning, half-time and at the end of the work has increased during 3 tests (simple task, positive and negative cueing tasks) without this difference being statistically significant. Conclusion: The alteration of vigilance with an ascent of the error rate among fixed night shift workers is a reality, which puts in question, not only the health of paramedical staff but also the care safety provided by these teams.

A network analysis of DSM-5 posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms and correlates in U.S. military veterans

ObjectiveRecent developments in psychometrics enable the application of network models to analyze psychological disorders, such as PTSD. Instead of understanding symptoms as indicators of an underlying common cause, this approach suggests symptoms co-occur in syndromes due to causal interactions. The current study has two goals: (1) examine the network structure among the 20 DSM-5 PTSD symptoms, and (2) incorporate clinically relevant variables to the network to investigate whether PTSD symptoms exhibit differential relationships with suicidal ideation, depression, anxiety, physical functioning/quality of life (QoL), mental functioning/QoL, age, and sex. MethodWe utilized a nationally representative U.S. military veteran’s sample; and analyzed the data from a subsample of 221 veterans who reported clinically significant DSM-5 PTSD symptoms. Networks were estimated using state-of-the-art regularized partial correlation models. Data and code are published along with the paper. ResultsThe 20-item DSM-5 PTSD network revealed that symptoms were positively connected within the network. Especially strong connections emerged between nightmares and flashbacks; blame of self or others and negative trauma-related emotions, detachment and restricted affect; and hypervigilance and exaggerated startle response. The most central symptoms were negative trauma-related emotions, flashbacks, detachment, and physiological cue reactivity. Incorporation of clinically relevant covariates into the network revealed paths between self-destructive behavior and suicidal ideation; concentration difficulties and anxiety, depression, and mental QoL; and depression and restricted affect. ConclusionThese results demonstrate the utility of a network approach in modeling the structure of DSM-5 PTSD symptoms, and suggest differential associations between specific DSM-5 PTSD symptoms and clinical outcomes in trauma survivors. Implications of these results for informing the assessment and treatment of this disorder, are discussed.

How children’s victimization relates to distorted versus sensitive social cognition: Perception, mood, and need fulfillment in response to Cyberball inclusion and exclusion

This study examined whether victimization is associated with negatively distorted social cognition (bias), or with a specific increased sensitivity to social negative cues, by assessing the perception of social exclusion and the consequences for psychological well-being (moods and fundamental needs). Both self-reported and peer-reported victimization of 564 participants (Mage=9.9years, SD=1.04; 49.1% girls) were measured, and social exclusion was manipulated through inclusion versus exclusion in a virtual ball-tossing game (Cyberball). Children’s perceptions and psychological well-being were in general more negative after exclusion than after inclusion. Moreover, self-reported—but not peer-reported—victimization was associated with the perception of being excluded more and receiving the ball less, as well as more negative moods and less fulfillment of fundamental needs, regardless of being excluded or included during the Cyberball game. In contrast, peer-reported victimization was associated with more negative mood and lower need fulfillment in the exclusion condition only. Together, these results suggest that children who themselves indicate being victimized have negatively distorted social cognition, whereas children who are being victimized according to their peers experience increased sensitivity to negative social situations. The results stress the importance of distinguishing between self-reported and peer-reported victimization and have implications for interventions aimed at victimized children’s social cognition.

Social Influences on Online Political Information Search and Evaluation

Americans are turning to the Internet to learn about politics in greater and greater numbers. Under the current “Web 2.0” paradigm in which users are encouraged to interact with online content, voters encountering political information on the Internet are typically exposed to more than just the news; online information is often colored by the reactions of previous readers, whether in the form of displayed comments or in readily apparent tallies of the number of “likes” or “shares” a particular item has received. In this paper we consider the effect these social cues have on online political information search and evaluation. Using processing-tracing software to monitor the patterns of information search and evaluation among our subjects, we find that social cues can function as a heuristic, allowing voters to reach judgments similar to those of their more informed counterparts. However, we also find that negative cues can adversely influence candidate evaluation, making subjects less disposed to a candidate than they would be in the absence of such signals.

Do global climate summits influence public awareness and policy preferences concerning climate change?

ABSTRACTA survey-embedded experiment implemented around the time of the 2014 annual Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (N ≈ 1200) examined whether such summits are able to increase citizens’ awareness of climate problems. This study finds that exposure to positive or negative cues about the COP increases climate change awareness, particularly among participants who start out with a low level of awareness. Neither positive nor negative cues about the COP significantly affect people’s policy preferences. Our finding resonates with Bernard Cohen’s observation that the mass media may not often be successful in telling people what to think, but they are successful in telling readers what to think about.