Impaired functional connectivity between the anterior insula and the inferior parietal lobule of the ECN distinguishes patients with bipolar depression from those with unipolar depression and healthy control subjects. This finding highlights a pathophysiological mechanism with potential as a therapeutic target and a clinical biomarker for bipolar disorder, exhibiting reasonable sensitivity and specificity.

Context: Smartphone use is being investigated as a potential behavioral addiction. Most of the studies opt for a subjective questionnaire-based method. This study evaluates the psychological correlates of excessive smartphone use. It uses a telemetric approach to quantitatively and objectively measure participants' smartphone use. Methodology: One hundred forty consenting undergraduate and postgraduate students using an Android smartphone at a tertiary care teaching hospital were recruited by serial sampling. They were pre-tested with the Smartphone Addiction Scale-Short Version, Big five inventory, Levenson's Locus of Control Scale, Ego Resiliency Scale, Perceived Stress Scale, and Materialism Values Scale. Participants' smartphones were installed with tracker apps, which kept track of total smartphone usage and time spent on individual apps, number of lock–unlock cycles, and total screen time. Data from tracker apps were recorded after 7 days. Results: About 36 % of participants fulfilled smartphone addiction criteria. Smartphone Addiction Scale score significantly predicted time spent on a smartphone in the 7-day period (β = 0.234, t = 2.086, P = 0.039). Predictors for time spent on social networking sites were ego resiliency (β = 0.256, t = 2.278, P = 0.008), conscientiousness (β = −0.220, t = −2.307, P = 0.023), neuroticism (β = −0.196, t = −2.037, P = 0.044), and openness (β = −0.225, t = −2.349, P = 0.020). Time spent gaming was predicted by success domain of materialism (β =0.265, t = 2.723, P = 0.007) and shopping by ego resiliency and happiness domain of materialism. Conclusions: Telemetric approach is a sound, objective method for evaluating smartphone use. Psychological factors predict overall smartphone usage as well as usage of individual apps. Smartphone Addiction Scale scores correlate with and predict overall smartphone usage.

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Decision making in both animals and humans is influenced by the anticipation of reward and/or punishment. Little is known about how reward and punishment interact in the context of decision making. The Avoidance-Reward Conflict (ARC) Task is a new paradigm that varies the degree of reward and the probability of punishment in a single paradigm that can be used in both non-human primates (NHPs) and humans. This study examined the behavioral pattern in the ARC task in both NHPs and humans. Two adult male NHPs (macaca mulatta) and 20 healthy human volunteers (12 females) participated in the ARC task. NHPs and humans perform similarly on the ARC task. With a high probability of punishment (an aversive air puff to the eye), both NHPs and humans are more likely to forgo reward if it is small or medium magnitude than when it is large. Both NHPs and humans perform similarly on the same behavioral task suggesting the reliability of animal models in predicting human behavior.