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This study aimed to examine the actual effect of down-regulation on the emotional consequences in adolescents with trait anxiety. A total of 19 adolescents with high trait anxiety (HTA) and 19 with low trait anxiety (LTA) participated in the experiment. Participants were tested for their down-regulating emotion performance in the Reactivity and Regulation-Image Task. Participants' real-time physiological responses were recorded, and their emotional arousal consequence were also subjective evaluated. The effect of arousal on down-regulation of negative emotions in the HTA group was no significantly smaller than that of the LTA group. Meanwhile, the HTA group had significantly higher percent change in autonomic consequences than the LTA group during and after the task. This study suggests that adolescents with HTA could effectively down-regulate their emotional arousal. The impairment of deliberate emotion regulation of high trait anxious adolescents is not reflected in the arousal but in physiological responses, which may continue to exist after the end of the task. This study extends to actual "Online" emotion regulation, finding that HTA adolescents are sensitive on physiological level, helping explain some differences in previous findings, and provide theoretical support for future studies using physiological indicators or increasing regulation time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In ths paper I outline my development over fifty years as a therapist, researcher and theorist. I started with empathy as a core helping process seeing it as a moment-bymoment information processing aid as well as a provision of the curative effects of human understanding. Over the years I added a focus on emotion as central to change, and proposed a number of necessary distinctions that needed to be made when working with emotion and concluded that one of the best ways to change emotion was with another emotion. In addition to my focus on moment by moment process I saw that identification of in-session experiential states and case formulation went beyond just being in the moment and helped provide more focus to an essentially phenomenologically based experiential approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on conservation of resources theory, the study aimed to investigate the relationship between work–family conflict (time-based, strain-based and behavior-based) and project manager abusive supervision in the presence of mediating mechanism and boundary condition. Time-lagged data were collected from 235 respondents working on construction projects to examine the proposed relationships by utilizing regression analysis. Findings indicated that the dimensions of work–family conflict had a positive significant relationship with abusive supervision and negative relationship with project commitment. Additionally, project commitment mediated the relationships and psychological resilience were found to alleviate the negative influence of work–family conflict on project commitment. Surprisingly, the results delineated that strain-based work–family conflict have more pronounced influence in instigating abusive supervision. This study is unique as it broadens the empirical research on work–family conflict and more particularly negative supervisor behavior in the project context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mood-incongruency effects in autobiographical recall have been conceptualized as a function of the emotion regulation through which the content and the phenomenology of the autobiographical memories serve to repair negative moods. Arguing that negative mood automatically activates mnemonic emotion regulation, in the present study we examined how negative emotions guide the subsequent spontaneous and instructed recall and whether distinct phenomenological patterns are observed in mnemonic regulation of sadness and anger. After participants watched video clips for sadness, anger, or happiness, they reported first any event that comes to their mind (spontaneous recall), then an event that specifically makes them happy (instructed recall). We found the changes in the phenomenology of the reported events was different for sadness and anger groups. While more robust changes were observed for sadness earlier in the spontaneous recall with higher phenomenological ratings than the anger group, in the instructed recall the difference disappeared, suggesting for the relatively late-onset compensation in the anger group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Accurately measuring children's emotion reactivity and regulation is important both for advancing theoretical understanding of child development and for identifying and monitoring children who have difficulties with emotional competence. Children have a uniquely important perspective on their own internal experiences of emotion reactivity and regulation that may differ from observers. However, there are few child-report measures of emotion reactivity and regulation. The goal of the present study was to develop and assess the psychometric properties of a child self-report measure of emotion reactivity and regulation (Youth Emotions Scale; YES) for elementary school-aged children. Examination of psychometric properties in a sample of 277 children (5 to 12 years old) oversampled for risk for emotional difficulties indicated good validity and reliability. Factor analyses indicated two theory-consistent factors (Reactivity and Emotion Regulation Strategies), both of which showed convergent and concurrent validity based on parent and child self-report of related constructs. This scale has both clinical and research utility, as having a brief measure of both emotion reactivity and regulation can aid clinicians and researchers in attaining relevant information without overtaxing children with multiple long measures. Future research should explore psychometric properties of the YES across different samples with different characteristics; if its validity continues to be supported, clinicians and researchers can utilize the YES to capture children's internal experiences of emotion reactivity and regulation in treatment and research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the study was to test the longitudinal reciprocal relationship between teachers' emotional labor strategies (i.e., deep acting, hiding emotions, and faking emotions) and teachers' self-efficacy (TSE). Additionally, due to a scarcity of the empirical research on teachers' stable individual differences that can explain teachers' emotion regulation and motivation, the role of teachers' dispositional affectivity (i.e., positive affectivity – PA and negative affectivity – NA) in predicting individual differences in teachers' use of emotional labor strategies and TSE was examined. A large sample of 3010 Croatian teachers (82% female) with varying years of teaching experiences (M = 15.28, SD = 10.50) participated in a three-wave longitudinal study. The results showed that TSE and hiding emotions were reciprocally related to each other even after controlling for dispositional affectivity – hiding emotions at Time 2 was related to lower levels of TSE at Time 3 and vice versa. Next, PA positively predicted TSE at both Time 2 and Time 3, but negatively hiding and faking emotions at Time 2. In addition, PA positively predicted deep acting only at Time 2. In contrast, NA positively predicted surface acting at Time 2 and Time 3, and negatively TSE, but only at Time 1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ability to regulate one's emotions is foundational for healthy development and functioning in a multitude of domains, whereas difficulties in emotional regulation are recognized as a risk factor for a range of adverse outcomes in childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. Caregivers play a key role in cultivating the development of emotion regulation through coregulation, or the processes by which they provide external support or scaffolding as children navigate their emotional experiences. The vast majority of research to date has examined coregulation in the context of caregiver–child dyads. In this paper, we consider emotion regulation and coregulation as family-level processes that unfold within and across multiple family subsystems and explore how triadic and whole family interactions may contribute to the development of children's emotion regulation skills. Furthermore, we will examine the implications of a family-centered perspective on emotion regulation for prevention of and intervention for childhood emotional and behavioral disorders. Because emotion regulation skills undergo such dramatic maturation during children's first several years of life, much of our focus will be on coregulation within and across the family system during early childhood; however, as many prevention and intervention approaches are geared toward school-aged children and adolescents, we will also devote some attention to later developmental periods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Caregivers play a central role in promoting emotion regulation throughout infancy, childhood, and adolescence. However, there are no existing psychometric measures to assess how parents assist children in employing emotion regulation strategies for negative emotions. We therefore developed the Parental Assistance with Child Emotion Regulation (PACER) Questionnaire to assess the degree to which parents assist their children in their use of ten different regulation strategies. In this paper, we describe the development of the PACER and examine its psychometric properties (N = 407 parents of children ages birth to 17 years). In so doing, we also use the PACER to comprehensively explore the links between parent-assisted emotion regulation and indices of parent and child stress, symptomatology, and attachment. Confirmatory factor analyses of the PACER items supported its intended ten-factor structure (corresponding to ten specific regulation strategies), which was invariant across different child age and sex categories. PACER scale scores had excellent internal consistency and generally acceptable test–retest reliability over a one-week period. Convergent validity was established via correlations between PACER scales and indices of parental emotion sensitivity, expressivity, and regulation, as well as parents' perception of the efficacy of their assistance with children's execution of emotion regulatory strategies. Lower parental facilitation of stereotypically adaptive emotion regulatory strategies was associated with higher child internalizing and externalizing problems and with poorer parent–child relationship quality. Overall, these findings suggest that the PACER may be a useful tool for the assessment of parental assistance with child emotion regulation across development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Little is known regarding structural brain changes in traumatized refugees and the association with psychopathology. In the present study, the cortical thickness in North Korean refugees and the association with psychological symptoms were explored. North Korean refugees with lifetime post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD group, n = 27), trauma-exposed North Korean refugees without lifetime PTSD (trauma-exposed control (TEC) group, n = 23), and healthy South Korean controls without traumatic experiences (HC group, n = 51) completed questionnaires assessing depression, anxiety, somatization, and PTSD symptoms. The cortical thickness was measured by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) using FreeSurfer. Age- and sex-adjusted cortical thickness of the right medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) was greater in the TEC group than in the HC group. However, significant differences were not observed between the PTSD and HC groups. Increased right mPFC thickness was significantly correlated with less anxiety and somatization after controlling for age and sex in the TEC group, but not in the PTSD or HC groups. North Korean refugees who did not develop PTSD after trauma showed increased right mPFC thickness, which was associated with less severe psychiatric symptoms. These findings indicate that increased mPFC thickness might have helped to reduce PTSD and psychiatric symptoms after trauma, and likely reflects resilience achieved by potentially enhancing emotional regulation in the mPFC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Behavioral addictions have been related with biased emotional reactions to risky choices. However, few studies have analyzed the role of both explicit and implicit emotional expression in gambling disorder (GD). This pilot study aims to examine emotion regulation in treatment-seeking patients with GD. The sample included n = 35 participants classified into three groups: patients with current GD, patients with GD in remission, and a control group without GD. Implicit emotional expressions were evaluated through a serious videogame (Playmancer) and explicit emotions were measured through self-reports. Patients in the current GD group had, compared to the remission and control groups, lower levels of implicit emotion expression and higher levels of explicit emotion expression. The patients in GD remission group endorsed better emotion regulation capacity in comparison to patients with current GD. We conclude that differences in emotion expression profiles (such as anger and anxiety) should be considered both in the development of screening and diagnostic measures and in the planning of prevention and treatment programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Different forms of verbal aggression are often present in cyberbullying, which may impair executive function skills that enable the regulation of emotions and behavior. Emotion and behavioral regulation has been associated with better social adjustment and more positive interactions between peers. This study aimed to understand if fostering emotion and behavioral regulation strategies could decrease aggressive communication. A quasi-experimental longitudinal design, based on a Twitter client mobile application, with pre-posttest measures was used. For the application, we explored different machine learning approaches, including computational intelligence methods. Multilevel linear modeling and frequency analyses were performed. A convenience sample of 218 adolescents (Mage = 14.67, SD = 0.84, 53% female) participated in the study. Results suggest that a Twitter client mobile application intervention based on emotion and behavioral regulation strategies may help decrease adolescents' aggressive communication. Moreover, female and male participants who used the digital application tended to present distinct trajectories over time with regard to searching for information concerning prosocial behavior. These findings suggest that digital tools resorting to emotion and behavioral regulation strategies may be effective in reducing an aggressive communication style amongst adolescents, and consequently, promote resource seeking to engage in prosociality. These results can be significant for the design of intervention programs against cyberbullying. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) manifests as emotional suffering and problem-solving impairments under extreme stress. This meta-analysis aimed to pool the findings from all the studies examining emotion and cognition in individuals with PTSD to develop a robust mechanistic understanding of the related brain dysfunction. We identified primary studies through a comprehensive literature search of the MEDLINE and PsychINFO databases. The GingerALE software (version 2.3.6) from the BrainMap Project was used to conduct activation likelihood estimation meta-analyses of the eligible studies for cognition, emotion and interface of both. Relative to the non-clinical (NC) group, the PTSD group showed greater activation during emotional tasks in the amygdala and parahippocampal gyrus. In contrast, the NC group showed significantly greater activation in the bilateral anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) than did the PTSD group in the emotional tasks. When both emotional and cognitive processing were evaluated, the PTSD group showed significantly greater activation in the striatum than did the NC group. No differences in activation between the PTSD and NC groups were noted when only the cognitive systems were examined. Individuals with PTSD exhibited overactivity in the subcortical regions, i.e., amygdala and striatum, when processing emotions. Underactivity in the emotional and cognitive processing intermediary cortex, i.e., the ACC, was especially prominent in individuals with PTSD relative to the NC population following exposure to emotional stimuli. These findings may explain the trauma-related fear, irritability, and negative effects as well as the concentration difficulties during cognitive distress associated with emotional arousal, that are commonly observed in individuals with PTSD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Given findings showing that emotion regulation may be enhanced through prefrontal neurostimulation, the present study examined whether the effect of transcranial direct current stimulation on emotional reactivity is mediated via biased interpretation, and whether emotion regulation goals further moderate this relationship. Methods: Healthy participants (n = 79) were allocated to one of four conditions to receive either active or sham tDCS concurrently with an emotion regulation task during which they were instructed to maintain or down-regulate their emotional reactions (between groups). A homograph priming task assessed biased interpretation, and emotional reactivity was assessed in response to a negative video viewing task. Results: Those receiving active tDCS showed smaller elevations in negative mood in response to viewing negative videos compared to sham stimulation. Neither tDCS condition nor emotion regulation condition had an impact on interpretive bias, and there was no evidence for tDCS-enhancement of emotion regulation. As such, interpretive bias did not significantly mediate the relationship between tDCS and emotional reactivity, and no moderating role of emotion regulation was observed. Conclusions: The present results are consistent with neural models implicating increased frontal activity with reduction in emotional reactivity, but provides no support for the role of interpretive bias in this relationship, and no evidence that tDCS enhanced the effects of emotion regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emotion regulation is crucial for coping with stressors but in turn can also be influenced by stress. Initial studies provided mixed evidence showing either beneficial or impairing stress effects on cognitive emotion regulation depending on stress timing, sex or the regulatory strategy. Here, we investigated the impact of acute stress on different emotion regulation strategies in men and women. N = 118 healthy participants were subjected to the Trier Social Stress Test or a control condition after which they completed an emotion regulation paradigm, requiring them to regulate their emotions in response to negative pictures using reappraisal or distraction. Cortisol levels were repeatedly measured to quantify changes in HPA axis activity. Affective ratings and pupil dilation served to measure emotion regulation success and the cognitive effort to regulate emotions. Stress reduced arousal and increased valence and success ratings for reappraisal in men, whereas no significant stress effects were found in women. Moreover, stressed men displayed a significant expansion of pupil diameter during reappraisal suggesting enhanced cognitive regulatory engagement, which ultimately may have led to better emotion regulation outcomes. Cortisol secretion positively correlated with subjective reappraisal success in men, suggesting a glucocorticoid-driven mechanism that may promote emotion regulatory performance in the aftermath of stress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tremendous individual differences exist in stress responsivity and social defeat stress is a key approach for identifying cellular mechanisms of stress susceptibility and resilience. Syrian hamsters show reliable territorial aggression, but after social defeat they exhibit a conditioned defeat (CD) response characterized by increased submission and an absence of aggression in future social interactions. Hamsters that achieve social dominance prior to social defeat exhibit greater defeat-induced neural activity in infralimbic (IL) cortex neurons that project to the basolateral amygdala (BLA) and reduced CD response compared to subordinate hamsters. Here, we hypothesize that chemogenetic activation of an IL-to-BLA neural projection during acute social defeat will reduce the CD response in subordinate hamsters and thereby produce dominant-like behavior. We confirmed that clozapine-N-oxide (CNO) itself did not alter the CD response and validated a dual-virus, Cre-dependent, chemogenetic approach by showing that CNO treatment increased c-Fos expression in the IL and decreased it in the BLA. We found that CNO treatment during social defeat reduced the acquisition of CD in subordinate, but not dominant, hamsters. This project extends our understanding of the neural circuits underlying resistance to acute social stress, which is an important step toward delineating circuit-based approaches for the treatment of stress-related psychopathologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although there is a growing interest in identifying the psychological strengths that enhance students' life satisfaction, there is a lack of understanding of the mechanisms involved in during adolescence. This study aimed to examine whether resilience serves as mediator in the relationship between perceived emotional intelligence and life satisfaction in adolescence. To prove this hypothesis, nine hundred and forty-five adolescent students were asked to complete several self-report questionnaires: the Trait Meta-Mood Scale, the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, and the Satisfaction with Life Scale. Analysis of the hypothesized model indicated that resilience mediated the association between the three dimensions of emotional intelligence (emotional attention, emotional clarity, and emotional repair) and life satisfaction. Results also revealed a direct influence of the sub-scale of emotional repair on life satisfaction. According to the multi-group test, the identified model was invariant across gender so that the resilient processes through which perceived emotional intelligence affects student's life satisfaction were similar for males and females. The present findings highlight the importance of developing resilience as a possible target for school interventions aimed at improving adolescent's life satisfaction. In addition to these implications, the article concludes with limitations and directions for further research suggesting the need for longitudinal studies beyond self-reported measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A neurocircuitry model of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) suggests increased amygdala responses to emotional stimuli, coupled with hypoactivation of prefrontal regions associated with cognitive control. However, results are heterogenous across different subsamples of PTSD as well as different paradigms. We investigated cognitive control in a classic and emotional Stroop task in 28 female patients with complex PTSD (cPTSD), 28 female trauma-exposed healthy controls (TCs) and 28 female non-trauma-exposed healthy controls (HCs) using functional neuroimaging. Afterwards, we assessed memory function in a spontaneous free recall and recognition task. Patients with cPTSD displayed significantly greater Stroop interference with trauma-related words (as reflected in slower reaction times and increased errors) compared to the other conditions and compared to the TC and HC groups. Moreover, patients with cPTSD showed increased activation in the context of trauma-related words in brain regions associated with cognitive control (dlPFC, vmPFC, dACC) compared to both control groups, and a trend for increased activation in the insula compared to the HC group. Increased recruitment of regions contributing to cognitive control in patients with cPTSD, together with a lack of amygdala response may point to efforts to compensate for emotional distraction caused by the trauma-related words. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Difficulties in the regulation of emotion are hypothesized to play a key role in the development and maintenance of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The current study used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to assess neural activity during task preparation and image presentation during different emotion regulation strategies, cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression, in PTSD. Patients with combat-related PTSD (n = 18) and combat-exposed controls (n = 27) were instructed to feel, reappraise or suppress their emotional response prior to viewing combat-related images during fMRI, while also providing arousal ratings. In the reappraise condition, patients showed lower medial prefrontal neural activity during task preparation and higher prefrontal neural activity during image presentation, compared with controls. No difference in neural activity was observed between the groups during the feel or suppress conditions, although patients rated images as more arousing than controls across all three conditions. By distinguishing between preparation and active regulation, and between reappraisal and suppression, the current findings reveal greater complexity regarding the dynamics of emotion regulation in PTSD and have implications for our understanding of the etiology and treatment of PTSD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Individuals in the early stages of a romantic relationship generally express intense passionate love toward their partners. This observation allows us to hypothesize that the regulation of interest in extra-pair relationships by executive control, which is supported by the function of the prefrontal cortex, is less required in individuals in the early stages of a relationship than it is in those who are in a long-term relationship. To test this hypothesis, we asked male participants in romantic relationships to perform a go/no-go task during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), which is a well-validated task that can measure right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC) activity implicated in executive control. Subsequently, the participants engaged in a date-rating task in which they rated how much they wanted to date unfamiliar females. We found that individuals with higher right VLPFC activity better regulated their interest in dates with unfamiliar females. Importantly, this relationship was found only in individuals with long-term partners, but not in those with short-term partners, indicating that the active regulation of interest in extra-pair relationships is required only in individuals in a long-term relationship. Our findings extend previous findings on executive control in the maintenance of monogamous relationships by highlighting the role of the VLPFC, which varies according to the stage of the romantic relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cognitive emotion regulation strategies are important components of cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). Additionally, up-regulation and difficulties in the down-regulation of negative feelings are associated with mental disorders. However, little is known about the lasting effects of cognitive emotion regulation strategies on emotional experience and associated neural activation. Therefore, this study investigated immediate and prolonged effects of emotion regulation using cognitive reappraisal and distraction on subjective report and its neural correlates. Twenty-seven healthy females took part in a 2-day functional magnetic resonance imaging study. They were instructed to either up-regulate or down-regulate their negative feelings using a situation-focused cognitive reappraisal strategy, to distract themselves by imagining a specific neutral situation, or to passively look at repeatedly presented aversive and neutral pictures. Re-exposure to the same stimuli without a regulation instruction was conducted one day later. Self-reported negative feelings and blood-oxygen-level-dependent responses served as main outcome variables. As expected, the results show successful immediate up- or down-regulation of negative feelings by cognitive reappraisal and down-regulation of negative feelings by distraction. Furthermore, these changes in negative feelings were correlated with amygdala activation. A lasting effect on emotional experience associated with stronger ventromedial prefrontal cortex activation was found for down-regulation of negative feelings via cognitive reappraisal. Compared to distraction, down-regulation via cognitive reappraisal led to reduced negative feelings and stronger dorso- and ventrolateral prefrontal cortex responses one day later. While cognitive reappraisal and distraction are both effective strategies during active regulation, only cognitive reappraisal had a lasting effect. These findings might have implications for CBT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current review examines characteristics of temporal affective functioning at both the individual and dyadic level. Specifically, the review examines the following three research questions: (1) How are dyadic affective flexibility and emotional inertia operationalized, and are they related to youth psychopathology? (2) How are dyadic affective flexibility and emotional inertia related, and does this relation occur at micro- and meso-timescales? and (3) How do these constructs combine to predict clinical outcomes? Using the Flex3 model of socioemotional flexibility as a frame, the current study proposes that dyadic affective flexibility and emotional inertia are bidirectionally related at micro- and meso-timescales, which yields psychopathological symptoms for youth. Specific future directions for examining individual, dyadic, and cultural characteristics that may influence relations between these constructs and psychopathology are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Building Emotion and Affect Regulation (BEAR) program is a theory-based group intervention for enhancing resilience in children, with a focus on strengthening emotion regulation. The BEAR is a 6-session protocol for children aged 7-12 who have been subject to traumatic life events. Objective: This paper presents the guiding principles of the BEAR program, evaluates its feasibility and presents the preliminary evidence from an open trial among children in residential group homes in Singapore. Methods: Ten BEAR groups (N = 73, mean age = 10.52, SD = 1.53) were conducted and evaluated with questionnaires for children, facilitators and caregivers before and after the intervention. Results: The BEAR program was well received by children, caregivers and facilitators. The children reported high enjoyment of the program, learning positive coping strategies, and elevated help-seeking behavior. Facilitators indicated that the content of the program was well understood by the children, and that the children cooperated well and showed high levels of competence in performing the tasks. Additionally, there were minimal signs of distress during the sessions. The caregivers reported an increase in emotion regulation, ( p < 0.001, Cohen's d = 0.437) and positive coping ( p = 0.003, Cohen's d = 0.389), as well as a decrease in general distress among the participants ( p = 0.036, Cohen's d = 0.266). Conclusions: This study demonstrated the feasibility of the BEAR intervention in children's residential group homes in Singapore and provided promising preliminary evidence for positive outcomes. There is a need for randomized controlled studies and further evidence from implementation of the BEAR program in other cultural contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emotional memory consolidation has been associated with rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, and recent evidence suggests that increased electroencephalogram spectral power in the theta (4-8 Hz) frequency range indexes this activity. REM sleep has been implicated in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as well as in emotional adaption. In this cross-sectional study, thirty young healthy African American adults with trauma exposure were assessed for PTSD status using the Clinician Administered PTSD Scale. Two consecutive night polysomnographic (PSG) recordings were performed and data scored for sleep stages. Quantitative electroencephalographic spectral analysis was used to measure theta frequency components sampled from REM sleep periods of the second-night PSG recordings. Our objective was to compare relative theta power between trauma-exposed participants who were either resilient or had developed PTSD. Results indicated higher right prefrontal theta power during the first and last REM periods in resilient participants compared with participants with PTSD. Right hemisphere prefrontal theta power during REM sleep may serve as a biomarker of the capacity for adaptive emotional memory processing among trauma-exposed individuals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neuroimaging techniques hold the promise that they may one day aid the clinical assessment of individual psychiatric patients. However, the vast majority of studies published so far have been based on average differences between groups. This study employed a multivariate approach to examine the potential of resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data for making accurate predictions about psychopathology in survivors of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake at an individual level. Resting-state functional MRI data was acquired for 121 survivors of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake each of whom was assessed for symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) using the 17-item PTSD Checklist (PCL). Using a multivariate analytical method known as relevance vector regression (RVR), we examined the relationship between resting-state functional MRI data and symptom scores. We found that the use of RVR allowed quantitative prediction of clinical scores with statistically significant accuracy (correlation=0.32, P=0.006; mean squared error=176.88, P=0.001). Accurate prediction was based on functional activation in a number of prefrontal, parietal, and occipital regions. This is the first evidence that neuroimaging techniques may inform the clinical assessment of trauma-exposed individuals by providing an accurate and objective quantitative estimation of psychopathology. Furthermore, the significant contribution of parietal and occipital regions to such estimation challenges the traditional view of PTSD as a disorder specific to the fronto-limbic network. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neuropeptide S (NPS) is a recently discovered G protein-coupled receptor ligand that modulates fear-like behaviors in rodents. A frequent A>T single-nucleotide polymorphism in the human NPS receptor gene NPSR1 confers a 10-fold higher efficacy of NPS signaling in vitro and has been linked with panic disorder (PD). We here report data from a classical fear-conditioning paradigm in healthy normal volunteers, in which carriers of the NPSR1 T allele evaluated their fear reactions to conditioned stimuli (CSs) as more pronounced than AA homozygous participants, although they did not show elevated peripheral-physiological conditioned responses (skin conductance responses-SCRs). T carriers also exhibited stronger CS-evoked brain activity in the rostral dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC), an area that supports the explicit, conscious appraisal of threat stimuli. By contrast, more caudally situated mid-dmPFC, which has previously been associated with the generation of SCRs, showed no elevated response. Moreover, rostral dmPFC activation was correlated with participants' fear evaluations, further strengthening the link of this activation to increased individual fear appraisal. Our data suggest a genetic and neuroanatomical substrate for catastrophizing overinterpretations of fear reactions and provide a mechanistic explanation for the association between the NPSR1 T allele and PD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neurodevelopmental risk factors have assumed a critical role in prevailing notions concerning the etiopathogenesis of neuropsychiatric disorders. Staging, diagnostic elements at which phase of disease is determined, provides a means of conceptualizing the degree and extent of factors affecting brain development trajectories, but is concurrently specified through the particular interactions of genes and environment unique to each individual case. For present purposes, staging perspectives in neurodevelopmental aspects of the disease processes are considered from conditions giving rise to neurodevelopmental staging in affective states, adolescence, dopamine disease states, and autism spectrum disorders. Three major aspects influencing the eventual course of individual developmental trajectories appear to possess an essential determinant influence upon outcome: (i) the type of agent that interferes with brain development, whether chemical, immune system activating or absent (anoxia/hypoxia), (ii) the phase of brain development at which the agent exerts disruption, whether prenatal, postnatal, or adolescent, and (iii) the age of expression of structural and functional abnormalities. Clinical staging may be assumed at any or each developmental phase. The present perspective offers both a challenge to bring further order to diagnosis, intervention, and prognosis and a statement regarding the extreme complexities and interwoven intricacies of epigenetic factors, biomarkers, and neurobehavioral entities that aggravate currents notions of the neuropsychiatric disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Every individual experiences stressful life events. In some cases acute or chronic stress leads to depression and other psychiatric disorders, but most people are resilient to such effects. Recent research has begun to identify the environmental, genetic, epigenetic and neural mechanisms that underlie resilience, and has shown that resilience is mediated by adaptive changes in several neural circuits involving numerous neurotransmitter and molecular pathways. These changes shape the functioning of the neural circuits that regulate reward, fear, emotion reactivity and social behaviour, which together are thought to mediate successful coping with stress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]