Development of Cognitive and Imaging Biomarkers Predicting Risk of Self-Blaming Bias and Recurrence in Major Depressio

抑郁症是全球残疾的主要原因。这主要是因为50%的人在他们的生活中有一个阶段的抑郁症将在未来发展进一步的阶段。一种解释是，过度责备自己的失败使人们更容易患上抑郁症。最近，我们已经能够识别大脑中与自责感（如内疚感）有关的部分。在一项初步研究中，我们已经证明，与从未患过抑郁症的人相比，有抑郁症病史但目前没有症状的人在涉及自责感的大脑网络中的串扰显示出异常。在拟议的项目中，我们将研究那些已经从抑郁症阶段完全康复的人，他们已经按照临床指南的建议停止了药物治疗。我们将首次调查这种与自责相关的大脑网络的异常程度是否可以预测明年内发展另一个抑郁阶段的风险。如果成功，该项目将有助于了解反复出现抑郁症倾向的大脑变化，并找到新的预防和治疗方法。

Depression is the leading cause of disability world-wide. This is mainly because 50% of people who have had one phase of depression in their life will develop further phases in the future. One explanation is that blaming oneself excessively for failures makes people more vulnerable for developing depression. Recently, we have been able to identify the parts of the brain involved in self-blaming feelings such as guilt. In a preliminary study, we have demonstrated that people with a history of depression, but currently free of symptoms, show abnormalities in the cross-talk within the brain network involved in self-blaming feelings compared with people who have never had depression. In the proposed project we will study people who have fully recovered from a phase of depression and who have stopped their medication as currently recommended by clinical guidelines. We will investigate for the first time, whether the degree of abnormalities in this self-blame-related brain network can predict the risk of developing another depressive phase within the next year. If successful, this project will help to understand what brain changes underlie the tendency to repeatedly develop depression and lead to new approaches to prevention and treatment.