Biological psychology
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Biological psychology · Mar 2011
Anterior cingulate cortex volume and emotion regulation: is bigger better?
Emotion dysregulation is a key feature of mood and anxiety disorders. Many of these disorders also involve volumetric reductions in brain regions implicated in emotion regulation, including the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC). Investigating this relationship in healthy individuals may clarify the link between emotion regulation and volumetric reductions in this key brain region. ⋯ As predicted, cognitive reappraisal was positively related to dACC volume, but not the volume of a control region, the ventral ACC. Expressive suppression, negative affect, and age were not related to dACC volume. These findings indicate that individual differences in cognitive reappraisal are related to individual differences in dACC volume in healthy participants.
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Biological psychology · Mar 2011
Serotonin transporter gene (5-HTTLPR) polymorphisms are associated with emotional modulation of pain but not emotional modulation of spinal nociception.
The short allele of the serotonin transporter gene (5-HTTLPR) is associated with greater negative emotionality. Given that emotion modulates pain, short allele carriers (s-carriers) may also demonstrate altered pain modulation. The present study used a well-validated emotional picture-viewing paradigm to modulate pain and the nociceptive flexion reflex (NFR, a measure of spinal nociception) in 144 healthy genotyped participants. ⋯ Neither emotional modulation of NFR nor NFR threshold was associated with 5-HTTLPR polymorphisms. Results also indicated that men who were s-carriers had a higher pain threshold and tolerance than other participants. Taken together, our results indicate 5-HTTLPR polymorphisms may influence pain modulation at the supraspinal (not spinal) level; however, the influence on pain sensitivity may be sex-specific.