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Background Patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) exhibit a diminished ability to think or concentrate, indecisiveness, and altered sensitivity to reward and punishment. These impairments can influence complex risk-related decision-making in dynamic environments. The neurophysiological mechanisms mediating MDD effects on decision-making behavior are not well understood. Methods Patients with MDD (N=50) and healthy controls (HC, N=40) were enrolled. They completed a series of psychometric tests. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded during the performance of a well-validated modified version of Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART). Results BART behavior data were similar across the two groups except the MDD patients showed more stability of risk aversion. Neurophysiologically, BART losses generated larger P3 amplitudes than wins, and MDD patients had larger feedback-related negativity (FRN) components than HCs in response to negative feedback (losses). Greater FRN amplitudes in response to losses correlated with higher levels of depressiveness, psychological pain, and anhedonia. A longer FRN latency in MDD patients was associated with more severe suicidal ideation. Limitations The findings are based on cross-sectional data, which are not powerful enough to make causal inferences. Conclusion MDD patients exhibit enhanced FRNs in the frontocentral region after receiving negative feedback in a risky decision-making task. FRN magnitude is associated with depressive symptom severity. Punishment hypersensitivity may contribute to the maintenance of depressive symptoms in MDD patients, and FRN may be a useful index of such hypersensitivity.

Objective Predicting suicide is notoriously difficult and complex, but a serious public health issue. An innovative approach utilizing machine learning (ML) that incorporates features of psychological mechanisms and decision-making characteristics related to suicidality could create an improved model for identifying suicide risk in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD). Method Forty-four patients with MDD and past suicide attempts (MDD_SA, N = 44); 48 patients with MDD but without past suicide attempts (MDD_NS, N = 48-42 of whom with suicide ideation [MDD_SI, N = 42]), and healthy controls (HCs, N = 51) completed seven psychometric assessments including the Three-dimensional Psychological Pain Scale (TDPPS), and one behavioral assessment, the Balloon Analogue Risk Task (BART). Descriptive statistics, group comparisons, logistic regressions, and ML were used to explore and compare the groups and generate predictors of suicidal acts. Results MDD_SA and MDD_NS differed in TDPPS total score, pain arousal and avoidance subscale scores, suicidal ideation scores, and relevant decision-making indicators in BART. Logistic regression tests linked suicide attempts to psychological pain avoidance and a risk decision-making indicator. The resultant key ML model distinguished MDD_SA/MDD_NS with 88.2% accuracy. The model could also distinguish MDD_SA/MDD_SI with 81.25% accuracy. The ML model using hopelessness could classify MDD_SI/HC with 94.4% accuracy. Conclusion ML analyses showed that motivation to avoid intolerable psychological pain, coupled with impaired decision-making bias toward under-valuing life's worth are highly predictive of suicide attempts. Analyses also demonstrated that suicidal ideation and attempts differed in potential mechanisms, as suicidal ideation was more related to hopelessness. ML algorithms show useful promises as a predictive instrument.

Background Obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (OCPD) is a high-prevalence personality disorder characterized by subtle but stable interpersonal dysfunction. There have been only limited studies addressing the behavioral patterns and cognitive features of OCPD in interpersonal contexts. The purpose of this study was to investigate how behaviors differ between OCPD individuals and healthy controls (HCs) in the context of guilt-related interpersonal responses. Method A total of 113 participants were recruited, including 46 who were identified as having OCPD and 67 HCs. Guilt-related interpersonal responses were manipulated and measured with two social interactive tasks: the Guilt Aversion Task, to assess how anticipatory guilt motivates cooperation; and the Guilt Compensation Task, to assess how experienced guilt induces compensation behaviors. The guilt aversion model and Fehr–Schmidt inequity aversion model were adopted to analyze decision-making in the Guilt Aversion Task and the Guilt Compensation Task, respectively. Results Computational model-based results demonstrated that, compared with HCs, the OCPD group exhibited less guilt aversion when making cooperative decisions as well as less guilt-induced compensation after harming others. Conclusion Our findings indicate that individuals with OCPD tend to be less affected by guilt than HCs. These impairments in guilt-related responses may prevent adjustments in behaviors toward compliance with social norms and thus result in interpersonal dysfunctions.

It is unclear whether the altered decision-making (DM) observed in patients with major depressive disorder (MDD) is neurophysiological and whether it improves with remission of depressive symptoms. The aim of this study was to identify developmental patterns of DM behavior, related cognitive characteristics, and electrophysiological abnormalities in patients with MDD across clinical stages.A sample of 48 first-episode MDD patients (FD group), 41 remitted MDD patients (RD group), and 43 healthy controls (HCs) completed psychometric assessments and performed the balloon analogue risk task (BART) while event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded.The RD group had lower depressiveness, self-blame, rumination, and catastrophizing tendencies, and higher mental resilience scores than the FD group, but retained significant differences from HCs. MDD patients showed a more conservative DM strategy than HCs, with no significant difference between the FD and RD groups. Compared to the FD group, the RD group had a smaller FRN for negative feedback and a trend toward a smaller P3 for positive feedback. Compared with HCs, the RD group had a smaller P3 during the positive feedback phase. FRN amplitude correlated positively with depression level and negatively with mental resilience.Because a comparative cross-section design was employed, longitudinal studies are needed to make causal inferences.MDD patients presented a stable risk-avoidance bias in actively depressed and remission periods, consistent with a state-independent impairment pattern. Significantly reduced FRN amplitudes during remission indicated a state-dependent impairment pattern, and FRN amplitudes correlated with depression level. An abnormal feedback P3 component may be a state-independent characteristic that may become more pronounced with MDD progression.

The Personality Inventory for the DSM-5 (PID-5) is an established tool for assessing personality disorder (PD) traits that was developed based on section III of the DSM-5. It is composed of 220 items, organized into 25 facets, which are distributed among five domains. The psychometric properties of the Chinese version of the PID-5 remain to be demonstrated. Two samples were embodied in this study that included 3,550 undergraduates and 406 clinical patients. To probe the structure of the PID-5, parallel analyses were conducted to explore the unidimensionality of its 25 facets and a series of confirmatory factor analyses (CFAs) were carried out to confirm the 25 lower-order facets and their distribution among five higher-order domains. Then, the PID-5 was employed to measure the DSM-5 and ICD-11 trait models and to explore the relationship of DSM-IV categorical PDs with DSM-5 and ICD-11 personality traits. Correlation and regression analyses were conducted to probe how well DSM-IV categorical PDs correspond with maladaptive personality traits specified in the DSM-5 and five ICD-11 domains. The respective average internal reliability coefficients of the 25 facets obtained for undergraduate and clinical patient samples were 0.76 and 0.81, those obtained for the five DSM-5 domains were 0.89 and 0.91, and those obtained for the five ICD-11 domains were 0.87 and 0.89. Serial CFAs confirmed the rationality of the PID-5's lower-order 25-facet structure and higher-order five-domain structure in both samples. Correlation and regression analyses showed that DSM-5 specified traits explain the variance in PD presentation with a manifold stronger correlation (R2 = 0.24–0.44) than non-specified traits (R2 = 0.04–0.12). Overall, the PID-5 was shown to be a reliable, stable, and structurally valid assessment tool that captures pathological personality traits related to DSM-5 and ICD-11 PDs.

Background The Personality Inventory for DSM-5 Brief Form (PID-5-BF) is a 25-item measuring tool evaluating maladaptive personality traits for the diagnosis of personality disorders(PDs). As a promising scale, its impressive psychometric properties have been verified in some countries, however, there have been no studies about the utility of the PID-5-BF in Chinese settings. The current study aimed to explore the maladaptive personality factor model which was culturally adapted to China and to examine psychometric properties of the PID-5-BF among Chinese undergraduate students and clinical patients. Methods Seven thousand one hundred fifty-five undergraduate students and 451 clinical patients completed the Chinese version of the PID-5-BF. Two hundered twenty-eight students were chosen randomly for test-retest reliability at a 4-week interval. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) were conducted to discover the most suitable factor structure in China, measurement invariance(MI), internal consistency, and external validity were also calculated. Results The theoretical five-factor model was acceptable, but the exploratory six-factor model was more applicable in both samples (Undergraduate sample: CFI = 0.905, TLI = 0.888, RMSEA = 0.044, SRMR = 0.039; Clinical sample: CFI = 0.904, TLI = 0.886, RMSEA = 0.047, SRMR = 0.060). In the Chinese six-factor model, the Negative Affect domain was divided into two factors and the new factor was named “Interpersonal Relationships”, which was in line with the Big-Six Personality model in Chinese. Measurement invariance across non-clinical and clinical sample was established (configural, weak, strong MI, and partial strict MI). Aside from acceptable internal consistency (Undergraduate sample: alpha = 0.84, MIC = 0.21; Clinical sample: alpha = 0.86, MIC = 0.19) and test-retest reliability(0.73), the correlation between the 25-item PID-5-BF and the 220-item PID-5 was significant(p Conclusions Both the theoretical five-factor model and the exploratory six-factor model of the PID-5-BF were acceptable to the Chinese population. The five-factor model could allow for comparison and integration with other work on the original theoretical model. However, the Chinese six-factor structure may be more culturally informed in East Asian settings. In sum, the PID-5-BF is a convenient and useful screening tool for personality disorders.

Objective We explored the neural mechanisms underlying disadvantageous risk decision making in un-medicated major depressive disorder patients who had recent suicide attempts. Methods 53 patients with major depressive disorder (MDD), including 23 with a history of suicide attempts (SA) and 30 without (NS), and 30 healthy controls (HCs) completed pertinent psychometric assessments, and the dynamic decision making balloon analogue risk task (BART) under fMRI. We also built a 4-parameter Bayesian computational modeling for decision making analyses. Results Several distinct findings emerged. First, SA patients had no depression intensity difference but higher pain avoidance in psychometrics, and more risk aversion in the BART when compared to the NS patients, with computational modeling confirming such reduced risk-taking propensity. Second, SA patients showed smaller left insular cortex activation than NS patients during the high risk, decisional phase of BART, and the modulation correlated with pain avoidance in both SA and NS groups. Third, during feedback phase of loss trials of the BART, SA patients had greater activation in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) than NS patients. Conclusion Taken together, we present novel findings and propose interpretations that the differential insula activation likely relates to high uncertainty-aversion in SA patients, contrary to the typical view that they are impulsive and risk prone. The differential left dlPFC activation likely suggests hypersensitivity to loss, contributing to conservative decision-making at large, and extreme choices such as suicide when value estimations are compromised and emotionally overwhelmed. The interactive interpretation places a renewed focus on psychological pain avoidance as a robust motivator for suicidal behavior.

This study aimed to analyze the potential relationship between bacterial community succession and the physicochemical properties of Aspergillus Douchi. Combing the cultivable method, high-throughput sequencing technology and physical and chemical properties determination during fermentation, the physicochemical parameters, microorganism number, and bacterial community diversity were investigated. The fermentation temperature in Douchi firstly increased and then decreased, most of them were around 45 ℃; the pH value continued to drop and finally reached to 4.86; the salt content was maintained at approximately 6%; and amino nitrogen and total acid contents increased steadily, while the contents of reducing sugar and total sugar continued to decline. The culture-dependent and real-time quantitative PCR results showed that the number of fungi and bacteria in Douchi decreased. The 16S rRNA gene sequencing revealed that the bacterial composition of Aspergillus-type Douchi in the early fermentation stages was dominated by Lactobacillus spp., Staphylococcus spp. and few Bacillus spp.. In the middle-late stages, the dominant bacteria shifted from Staphylococcus spp. and Lactobacillus spp. to Bacillus spp. Redundancy analysis showed that the fermentation environment influenced the bacterial community succession. Particularly, pH and temperature are important environmental parameters that promote the bacterial flora structure transformation and influence the diversity distribution. This study lays the foundation of the theoretical for the precise controlling of the Douchi fermentation.

Background: The Personality Inventory for DSM-5 Brief Form (PID-5-BF) is a 25-item measuring tool evaluating maladaptive personality traits for diagnosis of personality disorders(PDs). As a promising scale, its impressive psychometric properties has been verified in some countries, however, there has no studies about the utility of PID-5-BF in Chinese settings. The current study aimed to examine cultural applicability of the Chinese version of PID-5-BF among undergraduate students and clinical patients.Methods: 7155 undergraduate students and 451 clinical patients completed the Chinese version of PID-5-BF. 228 students were chosen randomly for test-retest reliability at a 4-week interval. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) were conducted to discover the most suitable construct in Chinese, measurement invariance(MI), internal consistency and external validity were also calculated. Results: An exploratory six-factor model was supported more suitable in both samples(Undergraduate sample: CFI = 0.905, TLI = 0.888, RMSEA = 0.044, SRMR = 0.039; Clinical sample: CFI = 0.904, TLI = 0.886, RMSEA = 0.047, SRMR = 0.060), adding a new factor“Interpersonal Relationships”. Measurement invariance across non-clinical and clinical sample was established(configural, weak, strong MI, and partial strict MI). Aside from acceptable internal consistency(Undergraduate sample: alpha=0.84, MIC=0.21; Clinical sample: alpha=0.86, MIC=0.19) and test-retest reliability(0.73), the association with 220-item PID-5 was significant(r = 0.93, p < 0.01), and six PDs measured by Personality diagnostic questionnaire-4+ (PDQ-4+) was correlated with expected domains of PID-5-BF. Conclusions: The Chinese version of the PID-5-BF showed satisfactory psychometric properties, which is a convenient and useful screening tool for personality disorders.

Background Anhedonia, a key symptom of depression and schizophrenia, has emerged as a potential endophenotype. The aim of this study was to evaluate the psychometric properties of a Chinese version of the Snaith-Hamilton Pleasure Scale(SHAPS), a self-report anhedonia scale, in a non-clinical sample and clinical sample inclusive of major depressive disorder (MDD), schizophrenia, or a personality disorder. Methods A total of 4,722 undergraduate students and 352 clinical patients participated in this study. Internal consistency was assessed by calculating Cronbach's α and mean inter-item correlation (MIC) values. Test-retest reliability and convergent validity were assessed with Pearson r coefficients. The best fitting of six potential factor-structure models was determined by confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Measurement invariance across genders and samples was determined by multi-group CFA. Results Internal consistency of the Chinese version of the SHAPS was acceptable in non-clinical (Cronbach's α = 0.90) and clinical (Cronbach's α = 0.91) samples. Four-week interval test-retest reliability was 0.60. Moreover, the Spanish four-factor structure had the best fit indexes in both samples. Scalar invariance was established across genders as well as across non-clinical sample and clinical sample. SHAPS was significantly related with the Temporal Experience of Pleasure Scale (TEPS) and Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). Limitations There was a restricted scope of convergent validity and the size of clinical sample is relatively small, psychometric properties in elderly sample is also required. Conclusion The Chinese version of the SHAPS is a reliable, effective, simple and convenient tool for assessing and screening for anhedonia.

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