Guerra LTL, Rocha JM, Osório FDL, Bouso JC, Hallak JEC, Dos Santos RG. Biases in affective attention tasks in posttraumatic stress disorder patients: A systematic review of neuroimaging studies.
Biol Psychol 2023;
183:108660. [PMID:
37597766 DOI:
10.1016/j.biopsycho.2023.108660]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/15/2023] [Revised: 07/24/2023] [Accepted: 08/16/2023] [Indexed: 08/21/2023]
Abstract
INTRODUCTION
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is characterized by alterations in emotional and cognitive processing. The current neurobiological model of PTSD posits that amygdala and prefrontal cortex functioning impairment underpins symptoms, such as altered emotional and cognitive processing. Additionally, these structures are key components of emotional and attention regulation.
AIM
This review sought to evaluate studies comparing PTSD group to non-PTSD controls performance in affective attention tasks during neuroimaging.
RESULTS
PTSD group behavioral performance when responding to affective stimuli differed from controls only in stroop-based tasks. However, neuroimaging techniques were able to identify brain activation differences even when behavioral differences were not present. Amygdala hyperactivation in PTSD patients was confirmed in most cases, but cortical networks results were not as consistent. More than a general reduction in activity, PTSD group data points out to impaired recruitment of ventral cortical structures and increased reliance on dorsal cortical structures during task performance.
CONCLUSION
Stroop-based tasks seem to be better at identifying differences in behavioral performance of PTSD individuals. PTSD individuals seems to present an altered brain activation pattern in affective attention tasks when compared to controls, where PTSD individuals seem to present enhanced amygdala activation and rely more on dorsal anterior cingulate cortex and posterior insula activation during tasks. The PROSPERO ID for this study is CRD42022355471.
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