An fMRI study of cognitive regulation of reward processing in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD)

Víctor De la Peña-Arteaga; Marcos Fernández-Rodríguez; Pedro Silva Moreira; Tânia Abreu; Carlos Portugal-Nunes; Carles Soriano-Mas; Maria Picó-Pérez; Nuno Sousa; Sónia Ferreira; Pedro Morgado

doi:10.1016/j.pscychresns.2022.111493

An fMRI study of cognitive regulation of reward processing in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD)

Víctor De la Peña-Arteaga, Marcos Fernández-Rodríguez, Pedro Silva Moreira, Tânia Abreu, Carlos Portugal-Nunes, Carles Soriano-Mas, Maria Picó-Pérez, Nuno Sousa, Sónia Ferreira, Pedro Morgado

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

6 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Background: Cognitive regulation can affect the process of decision making. Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) patients seem to have an impairment in cognitive regulation of reward processing concerning food stimuli. This study aims to explore the impact of GAD in cognitive regulation of food-related rewards. Methods: GAD patients (n=11) and healthy controls (n=15) performed a cognitive regulation craving task with food images while undergoing a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) acquisition. Between-group differences in functional connectivity were measured using dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) seeds during cognitive regulation. Results: During cognitive regulation, there was a significant interaction for functional connectivity between the right dlPFC and bilateral vmPFC with the thalamus. GAD patients had lower functional connectivity for cognitive regulation conditions (distance and indulge) than for the non-regulated condition in these clusters, while control participants presented the opposite pattern. GAD group presented fixed food valuation scores after cognitive regulation. Conclusions: GAD participants showed inflexibility while valuating food images, that could be produced by cognitive regulation deficits underpinned by functional connectivity alterations between prefrontal regions and the thalamus. These results show cognitive inflexibility and difficulty in the modulation of cognitive responses during decision making in GAD patients.

Original language	English
Article number	111493
Journal	Psychiatry Research - Neuroimaging
Volume	324
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pscychresns.2022.111493
Publication status	Published - Aug 2022
Externally published	Yes

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022

Funding

This work has been funded by Scientific Microscopy Platform, member of the national infrastructure PPBI - Portuguese Platform of Bioimaging (PPBI-POCI-01-0145-FEDER-022122; by National funds, through the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) - project UIDB/50026/2020 and UIDP/50026/2020 and by the project NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000039, supported by Norte Portugal Regional Operational Programme (NORTE 2020), under the PORTUGAL 2020 Partnership Agreement, through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). We thank CERCA Programme/Generalitat de Catalunya for institutional support. This project has received funding from the European Union Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklowdowska Curie grant agreement No. 714673 and Fundación Bancaria “la Caixa”. VDA was supported by “la Caixa” Foundation (ID 100010434, fellowship code LCF/BQ/IN17/11620071). CSM is supported by the Carlos III Health Institute, Spain (grant no. PI19/01171).

Funders	Funder number
de Catalunya
“La Caixa” Foundation	LCF/BQ/IN17/11620071, 100010434
FCT - Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia	UIDP/50026/2020, UIDB/50026/2020, NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000039
Instituto de Salud Carlos III	PI19/01171
European Union’s Horizon 2020 - Research and innovation program	714673
European Regional Development Fund

Keywords

Cognitive regulation
fMRI
generalized anxiety disorder
neuroimaging
prefrontal cortex
reward processing
thalamus

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10.1016/j.pscychresns.2022.111493

Cite this

De la Peña-Arteaga, V., Fernández-Rodríguez, M., Silva Moreira, P., Abreu, T., Portugal-Nunes, C., Soriano-Mas, C., Picó-Pérez, M., Sousa, N., Ferreira, S., & Morgado, P. (2022). An fMRI study of cognitive regulation of reward processing in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). Psychiatry Research - Neuroimaging, 324, Article 111493. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pscychresns.2022.111493

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title = "An fMRI study of cognitive regulation of reward processing in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD)",

abstract = "Background: Cognitive regulation can affect the process of decision making. Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) patients seem to have an impairment in cognitive regulation of reward processing concerning food stimuli. This study aims to explore the impact of GAD in cognitive regulation of food-related rewards. Methods: GAD patients (n=11) and healthy controls (n=15) performed a cognitive regulation craving task with food images while undergoing a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) acquisition. Between-group differences in functional connectivity were measured using dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) seeds during cognitive regulation. Results: During cognitive regulation, there was a significant interaction for functional connectivity between the right dlPFC and bilateral vmPFC with the thalamus. GAD patients had lower functional connectivity for cognitive regulation conditions (distance and indulge) than for the non-regulated condition in these clusters, while control participants presented the opposite pattern. GAD group presented fixed food valuation scores after cognitive regulation. Conclusions: GAD participants showed inflexibility while valuating food images, that could be produced by cognitive regulation deficits underpinned by functional connectivity alterations between prefrontal regions and the thalamus. These results show cognitive inflexibility and difficulty in the modulation of cognitive responses during decision making in GAD patients.",

keywords = "Cognitive regulation, fMRI, generalized anxiety disorder, neuroimaging, prefrontal cortex, reward processing, thalamus",

author = "{De la Pe{\~n}a-Arteaga}, V{\'i}ctor and Marcos Fern{\'a}ndez-Rodr{\'i}guez and {Silva Moreira}, Pedro and T{\^a}nia Abreu and Carlos Portugal-Nunes and Carles Soriano-Mas and Maria Pic{\'o}-P{\'e}rez and Nuno Sousa and S{\'o}nia Ferreira and Pedro Morgado",

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year = "2022",

month = aug,

doi = "10.1016/j.pscychresns.2022.111493",

language = "English",

volume = "324",

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De la Peña-Arteaga, V, Fernández-Rodríguez, M, Silva Moreira, P, Abreu, T, Portugal-Nunes, C, Soriano-Mas, C, Picó-Pérez, M, Sousa, N, Ferreira, S & Morgado, P 2022, 'An fMRI study of cognitive regulation of reward processing in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD)', Psychiatry Research - Neuroimaging, vol. 324, 111493. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pscychresns.2022.111493

TY - JOUR

T1 - An fMRI study of cognitive regulation of reward processing in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD)

AU - De la Peña-Arteaga, Víctor

AU - Fernández-Rodríguez, Marcos

AU - Silva Moreira, Pedro

AU - Abreu, Tânia

AU - Portugal-Nunes, Carlos

AU - Soriano-Mas, Carles

AU - Picó-Pérez, Maria

AU - Sousa, Nuno

AU - Ferreira, Sónia

AU - Morgado, Pedro

PY - 2022/8

Y1 - 2022/8

N2 - Background: Cognitive regulation can affect the process of decision making. Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) patients seem to have an impairment in cognitive regulation of reward processing concerning food stimuli. This study aims to explore the impact of GAD in cognitive regulation of food-related rewards. Methods: GAD patients (n=11) and healthy controls (n=15) performed a cognitive regulation craving task with food images while undergoing a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) acquisition. Between-group differences in functional connectivity were measured using dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) seeds during cognitive regulation. Results: During cognitive regulation, there was a significant interaction for functional connectivity between the right dlPFC and bilateral vmPFC with the thalamus. GAD patients had lower functional connectivity for cognitive regulation conditions (distance and indulge) than for the non-regulated condition in these clusters, while control participants presented the opposite pattern. GAD group presented fixed food valuation scores after cognitive regulation. Conclusions: GAD participants showed inflexibility while valuating food images, that could be produced by cognitive regulation deficits underpinned by functional connectivity alterations between prefrontal regions and the thalamus. These results show cognitive inflexibility and difficulty in the modulation of cognitive responses during decision making in GAD patients.

AB - Background: Cognitive regulation can affect the process of decision making. Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) patients seem to have an impairment in cognitive regulation of reward processing concerning food stimuli. This study aims to explore the impact of GAD in cognitive regulation of food-related rewards. Methods: GAD patients (n=11) and healthy controls (n=15) performed a cognitive regulation craving task with food images while undergoing a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) acquisition. Between-group differences in functional connectivity were measured using dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) and ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) seeds during cognitive regulation. Results: During cognitive regulation, there was a significant interaction for functional connectivity between the right dlPFC and bilateral vmPFC with the thalamus. GAD patients had lower functional connectivity for cognitive regulation conditions (distance and indulge) than for the non-regulated condition in these clusters, while control participants presented the opposite pattern. GAD group presented fixed food valuation scores after cognitive regulation. Conclusions: GAD participants showed inflexibility while valuating food images, that could be produced by cognitive regulation deficits underpinned by functional connectivity alterations between prefrontal regions and the thalamus. These results show cognitive inflexibility and difficulty in the modulation of cognitive responses during decision making in GAD patients.

KW - Cognitive regulation

KW - fMRI

KW - generalized anxiety disorder

KW - neuroimaging

KW - prefrontal cortex

KW - reward processing

KW - thalamus

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U2 - 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2022.111493

DO - 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2022.111493

M3 - Article

C2 - 35635931

AN - SCOPUS:85131093975

SN - 0925-4927

VL - 324

JO - Psychiatry Research - Neuroimaging

JF - Psychiatry Research - Neuroimaging

M1 - 111493

ER -

An fMRI study of cognitive regulation of reward processing in generalized anxiety disorder (GAD)

Abstract

Bibliographical note

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Keywords

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