Meta-Analysis of Functional Neuroimaging Studies of Emotion Perception and Experience in Schizophrenia

Abstract

Background Neuroimaging studies of emotion in schizophrenia have reported abnormalities in amygdala and other regions, although divergent results and heterogeneous paradigms complicate conclusions from single experiments. To identify more consistent patterns of dysfunction, a meta-analysis of functional imaging studies of emotion was undertaken. Methods Searching Medline and PsycINFO databases up through January of 2011, 88 potential articles were identified, of which 26 met inclusion criteria, comprising 450 patients with schizophrenia and 422 healthy comparison subjects. Contrasts were selected to include emotion perception and emotion experience. Foci from individual studies were subjected to a voxel-wise meta-analysis using multi-level kernel density analysis. Results For emotional experience, comparison subjects showed greater activation in the left occipital pole. For emotional perception, schizophrenia subjects showed reduced activation in bilateral amygdala, visual processing areas, anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), dorsolateral frontal cortex, medial frontal cortex and subcortical structures. Schizophrenia subjects showed greater activation in the cuneus, parietal lobule, precentral gyrus and superior temporal gyrus. Combining across studies and eliminating studies that did not balance on effort and stimulus complexity eliminated most differences in visual processing regions as well as most areas where schizophrenia subjects showed a greater signal. Reduced reactivity of the amygdala appeared primarily in implicit studies of emotion, whereas deficits in ACC activity appeared throughout all contrasts. Conclusions Processing emotional stimuli, schizophrenia patients show reduced activation in areas engaged by emotional stimuli, although in some conditions, schizophrenia patients exhibit increased activation in areas outside those traditionally associated with emotion, possibly representing compensatory processing.

Abnormal GABAergic Function and Negative Affect in Schizophrenia

“…Our primary hypothesis focused on the medial frontal cortex (MFC; including anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC)), a region involved in emotion regulation (Etkin et al, 2011) and abnormally activated in schizophrenia during emotion tasks (Taylor et al, 2012). We also predicted an interaction with activity in the anterior insula (aIns), a region involved in emotional responses (Kober et al, 2008) and associated with benzodiazepine-induced blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) effects on pain (Wise et al, 2007) and face emotion processing (Paulus et al, 2005).…”

Facial emotion processing in schizophrenia: a review of behavioural and neural correlates

“…Interpretation of such information requires the interaction of specific brain areas, such as the amygdala (for emotional perception), insula and basal ganglia (for emotional recognition), and prefrontal cortex and temporal lobe (for more complex social judgments) [4]. In SZ, abnormalities in social brain neural circuitry during facial emotion processing have been widely reported; however, results are somehow conflicting [51][52][53]. For example, some studies reveal under-recruitment of the amygdala [51,52], particularly in the processing of fearful faces (54), while others have reported intact activity [55] or even hyperactivity [56,57].…”

“…Habel et al [62] reported hyperactivation of the right precentral gyrus, extending to the right inferior frontal gyrus. A meta-analysis revealed that, during facial emotion perception, a larger signal was found in the cuneus, left parietal lobule, right precentral gyrus, and left temporal lobe; areas which are not commonly activated in emotional tasks (with the exception of the left temporal lobe) [53]. The au-thors speculated that patients might recruit non-emotional regions as a compensatory process.…”

The neuroimaging and genetics of emotion perception in schizophrenia

“…A number of neuroimaging metaanalyses have investigated the functional activation differences in SCZ during emotion perception (implicit and explicit emotion processing, and emotion identification and discrimination) (Delvecchio et al, 2013;Li et al, 2010;Taylor et al, 2012). In summary, decreased activation for patients, compared to healthy controls, was found in a wide distribution of regions including bilateral frontal regions, bilateral amygdala, right insula, bilateral anterior cingulate cortex, right thalamus, bilateral temporal regions and right basal ganglia.…”

“…Neuroimaging studies utilising functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) have identified regional brain activation abnormalities in SCZ, with the robust finding of altered activity in frontal regions, amygdala, and insula (Li et al, 2012;Li et al, 2010;Taylor et al, 2012).…”