Dissociable recruitment of rostral anterior cingulate and inferior frontal cortex in emotional response inhibition

Abstract

The integrity of decision-making under emotionally evocative circumstances is critical to navigating complex environments, and dysfunctions in these processes may play an important role in the emergence and maintenance of various psychopathologies. The goal of the present study was to examine the spatial and temporal dynamics of neural responses to emotional stimuli and emotionmodulated response inhibition. High-density event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were measured as participants (N = 25) performed an emotional Go/NoGo task that required button presses to words of a "target" emotional valence (i.e., positive, negative, neutral) and response inhibition to words of a different "distractor" valence. Using scalp ERP analyses in conjunction with source-localization techniques, we identified distinct neural responses associated with affective salience and affectmodulated response inhibition, respectively. Both earlier (~300 ms) and later (~700 ms) ERP components were enhanced with successful response inhibition to emotional distractors. Only ERPs to target stimuli differentiated affective from neutral cues. Moreover, source localization analyses revealed right ventral lateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC) activation in affective response inhibition regardless of emotional valence, whereas rostral anterior cingulate activation (rACC) was potentiated by emotional valence but was not modulated by response inhibition. This dissociation was supported by a significant Region × Trial Type × Emotion interaction, confirming that distinct regional dynamics characterize neural responses to affective valence and affective response-inhibition. The results are discussed in the context of an emerging affective neuroscience literature and implications for understanding psychiatric pathologies characterized by a detrimental susceptibility to emotional cues, with an emphasis on major depressive disorder.

Emotional modulation of motor response inhibition in women with borderline personality disorder: an fMRI study

“…The importance of the IFC for successful inhibition has been demonstrated in previous studies. 46,57,58 The modulating effect of anger on this region speaks in favour of dynamic models of emotion regulation and impulse control. 59,60 The relatively weaker IFC activation in the BPD group in the no-go/anger condition is in line with previous studies showing generally decreased prefrontal activation in patients with BPD.…”

Effects of Emotional Valence on Hemispheric Asymmetries in Response Inhibition

“…However, a number of studies have manipulated the emotional nature of imperative stimuli in central vision, while still keeping emotion itself incidental to the task [44][45][46][47][48][49]. The effect of emotion on behavioural measures is mixed across these studies, with some showing more errors on Nogo trials in emotional contexts [50], but most showing no behavioural effects [44,45,49].…”

“…However, more consistent findings are reported in the ERP measures. Most studies show no effect of emotion on the Nogo-N2 [44,45,49,51], although some have reported an attenuation of the N2 for emotional relative to neutral stimuli [46,47]. In contrast, emotional stimuli consistently enhance the Nogo-P3 [46,47,51], with effects sometimes greater for positive than for negative stimuli [44,45].…”

The Emotional Content of Faces Interferes with Inhibitory Processing: An Event Related Potential Study

“…5, No. 2; Holmes, & Pizzagalli, 2008;Gajewski & Falkenstein, in press). The present results coincide with previous reports in which N2 has been related to cognitive control or response conflict (see Folstein & Van Petten, 2008 for an extensive review) or the inhibition of a premature response plan (Gajewski & Falkenstein, in press).…”