Changes in the Effective Connectivity of the Social Brain When Making Inferences About Close Others vs. the Self

Esmenio, Sofia; Soares, José Miguel; Oliveira‐Silva, Patrícia; Gonçalves, Óscar F.; Friston, Karl J.; Coutinho, Joana

doi:10.3389/fnhum.2020.00151

Cited by 14 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 75 publications

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“…This finding may explain the lower precuneus activation that we found in the TBI group. The self-inhibition connections represent the decay rate of neural activity in each area and characterize the region’s susceptibility to the outside influence, with lesser self-inhibition indicating a region’s increased sensitivity to the inputs from other regions ( Esménio et al, 2020 ). Therefore, lower sensitivity toward the outside influence resulted in lower activity observed in the precuneus region.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Alteration in the Functional Organization of the Default Mode Network Following Closed Non-severe Traumatic Brain Injury

et al. 2022

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The debilitating effect of traumatic brain injury (TBI) extends years after the initial injury and hampers the recovery process and quality of life. In this study, we explore the functional reorganization of the default mode network (DMN) of those affected with non-severe TBI. Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a wide-spectrum disease that has heterogeneous effects on its victims and impacts everyday functioning. The functional disruption of the default mode network (DMN) after TBI has been established, but its link to causal effective connectivity remains to be explored. This study investigated the differences in the DMN between healthy participants and mild and moderate TBI, in terms of functional and effective connectivity using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Nineteen non-severe TBI (mean age 30.84 ± 14.56) and twenty-two healthy (HC; mean age 27.23 ± 6.32) participants were recruited for this study. Resting-state fMRI data were obtained at the subacute phase (mean days 40.63 ± 10.14) and analyzed for functional activation and connectivity, independent component analysis, and effective connectivity within and between the DMN. Neuropsychological tests were also performed to assess the cognitive and memory domains. Compared to the HC, the TBI group exhibited lower activation in the thalamus, as well as significant functional hypoconnectivity between DMN and LN. Within the DMN nodes, decreased activations were detected in the left inferior parietal lobule, precuneus, and right superior frontal gyrus. Altered effective connectivities were also observed in the TBI group and were linked to the diminished activation in the left parietal region and precuneus. With regard to intra-DMN connectivity within the TBI group, positive correlations were found in verbal and visual memory with the language network, while a negative correlation was found in the cognitive domain with the visual network. Our results suggested that aberrant activities and functional connectivities within the DMN and with other RSNs were accompanied by the altered effective connectivities in the TBI group. These alterations were associated with impaired cognitive and memory domains in the TBI group, in particular within the language domain. These findings may provide insight for future TBI observational and interventional research.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Alteration in the Functional Organization of the Default Mode Network Following Closed Non-severe Traumatic Brain Injury

et al. 2022

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“…Slow 5 fALFF in these regions increased and were positively correlated with the decrease in HDRS. PCC/PCu plays an important role in making inferences regarding the mental states ( 74 ) and perceiving and processing psychosocial stress ( 75 ). Some scientists reported decreased fALFF of PCu in psychotic bipolar disorder by means of fMRI ( 21 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Frequency-Specific Changes in the Fractional Amplitude of the Low-Frequency Fluctuations in the Default Mode Network in Medication-Free Patients With Bipolar II Depression: A Longitudinal Functional MRI Study

Zhou

et al. 2021

Front. Psychiatry

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Objective: This study aimed to examine the treatment-related changes of the fractional amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations (fALFF) in the default mode network (DMN) across different bands after the medication-free patients with bipolar II depression received a 16-week treatment of escitalopram and lithium.Methods: A total of 23 medication-free patients with bipolar II depression and 29 healthy controls (HCs) were recruited. We evaluated the fALFF values of slow 4 (0.027–0.073 Hz) band and slow 5 (0.01–0.027 Hz) band of the patients and compared the results with those of the 29 HCs at baseline. After 16-week treatment of escitalopram with lithium, the slow 4 and slow 5 fALFF values of the patients were assessed and compared with the baselines of patients and HCs. The depressive symptoms of bipolar II depression in patients were assessed with a 17-item Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS) before and after treatment.Results: Treatment-related effects showed increased slow 5 fALFF in cluster D (bilateral medial superior frontal gyrus, bilateral superior frontal gyrus, right middle frontal gyrus, and bilateral anterior cingulate), cluster E (bilateral precuneus/posterior cingulate, left cuneus), and cluster F (left angular, left middle temporal gyrus, left superior temporal gyrus, and left supramarginal gyrus) in comparison with the baseline of the patients. Moreover, a positive association was found between the increase in slow 5 fALFF values (follow-up value minus the baseline values) in cluster D and the decrease in HDRS scores (baseline HDRS scores minus follow-up HDRS scores) at follow-up, and the same association between the increase in slow 5 fALFF values and the decrease in HDRS scores was found in cluster E.Conclusions: The study reveals that the hypoactivity of slow 5 fALFF in the DMN is related to depression symptoms and might be corrected by the administration of escitalopram with lithium, implying that slow 5 fALFF of the DMN plays a key role in bipolar depression.

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“…The total duration of the task was 1,364 s (24 min). More detailed information regarding this task can be found in Esménio et al (50,67).…”

Section: Socio-cognitive Taskmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…On the other hand, despite the ability of traditional FC methods to detect consistent spatiotemporal relationships between different brain regions, they do not assess the direct influence that one brain region exerts over another. This can be done through effective connectivity analysis (84) that, as showed in our previous work (67), considers how the information flows through the brain regions of a given network as well as between networks (85). For example, the knowledge of the information flow between socio-affective and socio-cognitive networks will clarify if these networks are hierarchically related, with the ability to abstract mental state attributions being dependent on the ability to simulate the other state.…”

Section: Limitations and Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Interplay Between the Salience and the Default Mode Network in a Social-Cognitive Task Toward a Close Other

et al. 2022

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Social cognition relies on two main subsystems to construct the understanding of others, which are sustained by different social brain networks. One of these social networks is the default mode network (DMN) associated with the socio-cognitive subsystem (i.e., mentalizing), and the other is the salience network (SN) associated with the socio-affective route (i.e., empathy). The DMN and the SN are well-known resting state networks that seem to constitute a baseline for the performance of social tasks. We aimed to investigate both networks' functional connectivity (FC) pattern in the transition from resting state to social task performance. A sample of 38 participants involved in a monogamous romantic relationship completed a questionnaire of dyadic empathy and underwent an fMRI protocol that included a resting state acquisition followed by a task in which subjects watched emotional videos of their romantic partner and elaborated on their partner's (Other condition) or on their own experience (Self condition). Independent component and ROI-to-ROI correlation analysis were used to assess alterations in task-independent (Rest condition) and task-dependent (Self and Other conditions) FC. We found that the spatial FC maps of the DMN and SN evidenced the traditional regions associated with these networks in the three conditions. Anterior and posterior DMN regions exhibited increased FC during the social task performance compared to resting state. The Other condition revealed a more limited SN's connectivity in comparison to the Self and Rest conditions. The results revealed an interplay between the main nodes of the DMN and the core regions of the SN, particularly evident in the Self and Other conditions.

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Changes in the Effective Connectivity of the Social Brain When Making Inferences About Close Others vs. the Self

Cited by 14 publications

References 75 publications

Alteration in the Functional Organization of the Default Mode Network Following Closed Non-severe Traumatic Brain Injury

Alteration in the Functional Organization of the Default Mode Network Following Closed Non-severe Traumatic Brain Injury

Frequency-Specific Changes in the Fractional Amplitude of the Low-Frequency Fluctuations in the Default Mode Network in Medication-Free Patients With Bipolar II Depression: A Longitudinal Functional MRI Study

Interplay Between the Salience and the Default Mode Network in a Social-Cognitive Task Toward a Close Other

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