Investigating the interaction of emotional reactivity and neural reward processing in patients with complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

研究复杂创伤后应激障碍患者情绪反应与神经奖励处理的相互作用

• 批准号: 407290351
• 负责人: Privatdozent Dr. Joe Jacques Simon, Ph.D.
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Klinik für Allgemeine Innere Medizin und Psychosomatik
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Grants
• 财政年份: 2018
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2017-12-31 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/407290351?language=en
• 关键词: Investigating; interaction; emotional; reactivity; neural

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a serious, potentially debilitating condition that can develop after experiencing a traumatic event. Complex PTSD is a sub-type of PTSD where multiple, prolonged and often interpersonal traumatic experiences cause additional disturbances in the domains of emotional processing, self-organization, as well as interpersonal relationships. Dysfunctional emotional processing plays a fundamental role in the development and maintenance of complex PTSD, and is thought to cause reduced reward motivation as well as cognitive impairments. However, the underlying neural mechanisms of these symptoms are still poorly understood. Previous studies suggest a hyper-reactivity of emotional brain networks causing attentional bias toward threat, as well as an increased fear response. Therefore, the aim of the proposed study is to unravel how fear-induced dysfunctional attribution of saliency to the environment contributes to impaired cognitive processing and reward-based decision making in complex PTSD. A better understanding of these psychobiological mechanisms is a fundamental requirement for the development of improved prevention and treatment strategies. This will be achieved by employing a functional neuroimaging procedure with an experimental task which allows investigating the direct interaction between emotional, reward and cognitive processes. This paradigm will allow assessing if the observed hyper-reactivity of the fear network is a causal factor for both decreased cognitive as well as decreased reward processing.

创伤后应激障碍（PTSD）是一种严重的，潜在的衰弱状态，可以在经历创伤事件后发展。复杂性创伤后应激障碍是创伤后应激障碍的一种亚型，其中多重，长期和经常是人际创伤经历导致情绪处理，自我组织以及人际关系领域的额外干扰。功能失调的情绪处理在复杂的PTSD的发展和维持中起着重要作用，并被认为会导致奖励动机减少以及认知障碍。然而，这些症状的潜在神经机制仍然知之甚少。先前的研究表明，情绪大脑网络的过度反应导致对威胁的注意力偏差，以及增加的恐惧反应。因此，拟议的研究的目的是解开恐惧引起的功能障碍归因于环境的显着性如何有助于受损的认知加工和奖励为基础的决策在复杂的PTSD。更好地了解这些心理生物学机制是制定更好的预防和治疗战略的基本要求。这将通过采用功能性神经成像程序与实验任务来实现，该实验任务允许调查情感，奖励和认知过程之间的直接相互作用。这种范式将允许评估所观察到的恐惧网络的过度反应是否是认知减少以及奖励处理减少的因果因素。