BackgroundMajor depressive disorder is associated with very high recurrence rates, and specific vulnerability factors that increase the risk for repeated episodes should be identified. Impaired executive functions have repeatedly been found in remitted populations. The current study included both neutral and emotional executive tasks, and we expected to find impaired performance in unmedicated previously depressed women compared to controls. Furthermore, we hypothesized that the executive functions inhibition and shifting would be related to the ability to apply cognitive reappraisal and to avoid unhealthy rumination.MethodsInhibition and shifting data derived from neutral and emotional computerized tasks, and questionnaire data on emotion regulation and trait rumination, were obtained from previously depressed (n = 109) and never-depressed women (n = 64) and analyzed in independent samples t-tests. A logistic regression analysis investigated the ability of emotion regulation and rumination to predict depression vulnerability. The associations of executive functions to emotion regulation and rumination were investigated in a series of linear regression analyses. Participants on psychotropic medication were excluded from all analyses of executive performance.ResultsPreviously depressed participants, the majority of which had experienced recurrent episodes, matched control participants on both neutral and emotional executive tasks. However, significantly more rumination and expressive suppression, and less cognitive reappraisal, were found in the previously depressed group. Executive function was unrelated to rumination and emotion regulation in this sample.ConclusionsPreviously depressed women whose executive function was intact were characterized by ruminative tendencies and more frequent use of expressive suppression. Trait rumination and expressive suppression are known to increase depression risk, but were unrelated to executive functions in this population. This indicates that unhealthy emotion regulation strategies may be targeted directly in preventive interventions.

Binge drinking leads to brain damage. However, at present few studies have taken into account the continuity in the binge drinking phenomenon, and treated binge drinking as a clearly separable category from other types of drinking patterns. The aim of the present study was to investigate whether severity of binge drinking can predict specific neurocognitive changes in healthy young adults. A total of 121 students aged 18 to 25 were assessed by means of the three last questions of the Alcohol Use Questionnaire combined into binge score. The binge score was entered as a predictor of cognitive performance of the CANTAB Stop Signal Task including reaction time, inhibition processing time, and response adjustment. Anxiety and depression symptoms were also measured. Binge score significantly predicted less adjustment following failures, and faster reaction times. Binge score did not predict inhibition performance. Symptoms of depression and anxiety were not significantly related to binge score. Binge drinking in healthy young adults predicts impairment in response adjustment and fast reaction time, but is unrelated to inhibition. The study supports the view that binge drinking is a continuous phenomenon, rather than discrete category, and the findings are possibly shedding light on why binge drinkers continue their drinking pattern despite negative consequences. (JINS, 2016, 22, 38-46).

Serotoninergic transmission is reliably implicated in inhibitory control processes. The aim of this study was to test the hypothesis if serotonin transporter polymorphisms mediate inhibitory control in healthy people. 141 healthy subjects, carefully screened for previous and current psychopathology, were genotyped for the 5-HTTLPR and rs25531 polymorphisms. Inhibitory control was ascertained with the Stop Signal Task (SST) from the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB). The triallelic gene model, reclassified and presented in a biallelic functional model, revealed a dose-dependent gene effect on SST performance with Individuals carrying the low expressive allele had inferior inhibitory control compared to high expressive carriers. This directly implicates serotonin transporter polymorphisms (5-HTTLPR plus rs25531) in response inhibition in healthy subjects.

Emotional activation can interfere with cognitive control processes in healthy individuals, and depression is associated with impaired disengagement from negative information. However, traditional measures of executive functions are free from emotionally relevant stimuli. In the current study we designed a new task based on the structure of the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST), using emotional faces as stimuli. Here 110 adult participants performed either the Emotional Picture Sorting Task (EPST) or the WCST. Generally, participants performed the EPST similarly to the WCST, but significantly more trials were needed to complete the EPST. Results across six outcome variables indicate that the EPST was somewhat more difficult than the WCST. Larger standard deviations were observed in the EPST group, suggesting that the emotional stimuli might have had an interfering effect in some, but not in all, individuals. This task may become useful as a psychometric test of executive control over emotional stimuli.

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