情绪加工缺损不仅是精神分裂症患者的一个核心症状，也可作为预测患者预后状况的一个关键因素。
近日，《精神分裂症研究》杂志上刊登了一项研究成果称，中科院心理健康重点实验室神经心理学与应用认知神经科学实验室陈楚侨课题组在此方面获进展，他们在试图探讨情绪识别异常是否可作为精神分裂症的一个生物标记时发现，精神分裂症患者未发病的兄弟姐妹已表现出轻微的面孔情绪加工异常。
据介绍，已有的情绪加工缺损方面的研究主要以精神分裂症患者作为被试，且患者主要来自西方国家。此外，情绪知觉和情绪加工受文化因素影响，因此人们对一些精神分裂症高危个体是否存在类似的情绪加工异常知之甚少。
在此项最新研究中，陈楚侨和博士生李会杰设计了一个功能磁共振成像实验，邀请了36名被试，分别为精神分裂症患者、患者未发病的兄弟姐妹和健康控制组，每组各12人参与实验，判断“快乐”、“害怕”和“中性情绪面孔”的情绪效价。
研究结果表明：精神分裂症患者未发病的兄弟姐妹在加工情绪面孔时表现出和患者非常类似的缺损——这两组被试的社会脑神经网络（比如运动前回和额上回）激活异常；其异常程度较精神分裂症患者稍轻。该发现表明，遗传学上具有精神分裂症高风险的个体，如患者未发病的兄弟姐妹在面部情绪加工过程中表现出轻度缺损，而且这种缺损可能是精神分裂症一个潜在的内表型。
该研究受到中科院知识创新工程、“973”项目和国家杰出青年基金项目的支持。此外，中科院心理所磁共振成像研究中心也为研究提供了帮助。(生物谷 Bioon.com)
doi:10.1016/j.schres.2011.10.019
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Facial emotion processing in patients with schizophrenia and their non-psychotic siblings: A functional magnetic resonance imaging study
Hui-jie Li, Raymond C.K. Chan, Qi-yong Gong, Yu Liu, Shan-ming Liu, David Shum, Zhen-ling Ma
Background
Previous studies have shown that patients with schizophrenia show abnormalities in brain activation when processing emotional faces. However, very few studies have examined if such abnormalities are also found in non-western patient samples and in at-risk individuals. The current study explored whether patients with schizophrenia and siblings of patients in China would show abnormal brain activation during processing of emotional faces.
Methods
Thirty-six participants (three groups of twelve each of patients with schizophrenia, nonpsychotic siblings, and healthy controls) took part in the study. They were administered a task to judge emotional valence of three types of faces (viz., happy, fearful, and neutral), during fMRI scanning.
Results
Results of this study demonstrated that patients with schizophrenia showed abnormalities in the social brain neural circuit during facial emotion processing, in comparison with nonpsychotic siblings and healthy controls. Patients with schizophrenia demonstrated lower activation right superior and middle frontal gyrus, left precentral gyrus, left middle temporal gyrus and left insula in comparison with healthy controls; and showed abnormal activation in bilateral inferior and middle frontal gyri, right orbital frontal gyrus, left superior and middle temporal gyrus, bilateral insula, and right superior parietal gyrus/postcentral gyrus when compared with their nonpyschotic siblings. Meanwhile, patients with schizophrenia showed greater activation in left middle frontal gyrus than healthy controls, and overactivation in bilateral middle frontal gyri, right orbital frontal gyrus and left middle temporal gyrus than their nonpsychotic siblings during processing of fearful faces. Moreover, nonpsychotic siblings seemed to share some similar dysfunctions in processing facial expressions as their psychotic probands, the two groups both showed abnormal activation in precentral and superior frontal gyri, and such abnormal activation lied between patients with schizophrenia and healthy controls.
Conclusions
The current findings support the universality of emotion perception impairments in schizophrenia, and also suggest that facial emotion perception might be a potential endophenotype of schizophrenia.
