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Todd Woodward
Department of Psychiatry, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) provides information about the flow of blood-oxygen-level-dependent (BOLD) signal in the brain. The fact that BOLD signal flow forms into reliable configurations is well established, referred to as macro-scale BOLD brain networks. Timing information from cognitive tasks can be used to constrained variance in BOLD signal, and when submitted to a dimensional analysis, this produces macro-scale BOLD brain networks which span many tasks, and their function can be determined be observing their activation patterns over a range of task conditions. In this way, task-based fMRI can be used to determine which brain networks are involved in the symptoms of schizophrenia. For example, a brain network involved in re-evaluation of evidence showed reduced activation in patients experiencing delusions, as did another involved in inspection of evidence. This combination of glossing over evidence and neglecting re-evaluation may underlie the jumping to conclusions and fixedness that characterize delusions. For patients experiencing hallucinations, we see hyperactivation of a superior temporal gyrus (STG) network involved in external auditory perception, and hypoactivation in a linguistic processing network (LPN) for internal processing. This combination may underlie the impaired balance between internal and external linguistic processes (underactivity in networks involved in internal auditory imagery and overactivity in networks involved in speech perception) leading to externalizations in hallucinations. However, this must be integrated with the evidence that the on-line experience of a hallucination does not produce the same BOLD brain activity as true auditory perception. This approach to understanding the function of the brain networks underlying the symptoms of schizophrenia can lead to insights regarding optimal treatment through therapy or neuromodulation.
Rafal M. Skiba
Department of Psychiatry, Cognitive Neuroscience of Schizophrenia Lab, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
In this presentation, I will delve into the nuanced dynamics between negative symptoms and cognitive functions in Schizophrenia Spectrum Disorders (SSD). This segment dissects how distinct negative symptoms, such as alogia and flat affect, contribute to cognitive deficits, particularly verbal memory impairment. I will then discuss the linkage between working memory impairments and motor impoverishment, exposing the specific brain networks implicated in this interplay.
Drawing on data from two extensive studies involving over 500 SSD patients, I will provide a detailed account of these symptom-cognition relationships. In the second part of my talk, I will examine the interface between apathy, asociality and metacognition, offering a novel perspective on how SSD patients’ metacognitive capacities are influenced by their emotional detachment and how they are represented in images of the working brain. Concluding the session, the talk will pivot to the implications of these findings for treatment, discussing potential interventions to mitigate cognitive impairments and their underlying symptoms.
Funding: Rafal M. Skiba received a Research Trainee Grant (RT-2021-1899) from the Michael Smith Health Research BC / BC Schizophrenia Society Foundation, which supported his work on this project.
Wiktor Więcławski1, Krzysztof Bielski1, Marek Binder1, Przemysław Adamczyk1
1Department of Clinical Psychology, Institute of Psychology, Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland
Disturbances in the motor system are commonly present in schizophrenia. Recent fMRI resting-state findings show aberrant functional connectivity within somatomotor network (SMN) in schizophrenia. Currently, it is important to validate those findings and establish their relationship with psychopathology. Therefore, we decided to take an entirely data-driven approach in our fMRI resting-state study of 30 chronic schizophrenia outpatients and 30 matched control subjects. Utilizing independent component analysis (ICA), dual regression, and seed-based connectivity, we show hypoconnectivity within SMN in schizophrenia and SMN dysconnectivity with the cerebellum. The latter is strongly correlated with the intensity of alogia, i.e. poverty of speech. Our results are consistent with the theoretical approach to the role of the cerebellum in psychiatric disorders. The presented findings suggest that the cerebellum might play an important role in the persistence and severity of alogia in schizophrenia.
Funding: The study was supported by the National Science Centre Poland under grant no. 2016/23/B/HS6/00286 and 2021/41/B/HS6/02967
Camilo Sanchez
Department of Social Sciences & Humanities, Philosophy of Mental Health Unit, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Poznan, Poland
Recent functional connectivity studies showed that the increased synchrony between the right anterior insula and the default mode network are associated with psychosis. This association is proposed in the paper to be correlated with the disrupted dynamics between the implicit and explicit temporal experience in psychotic patients. The aim of the paper is to assess the relation between the functional connectivity findings, regarding the dynamics between relevant large–scale brain networks, and the phenomenological psychopathology findings, regarding the dynamics between the relevant temporal and bodily–movement experiences, in schizophrenia patients. The research question is: How is the relation between the functional dynamic activity of the right anterior insula, the Default Mode, Central Executive and Salience Networks, and the dynamic between the implicit and explicit temporal experience, in schizophrenia patients?
To answer the question 7 schizophrenia patients (PANSS score≥ 40) & 7 healthy controls were scanned (resting-state fMRI) and interviewed. The scan conveyed two trials, in the first the participants were asked to keep their eyes closed without falling asleep (for 6 mins 34 secs) and no stimulus was presented, in the second the participants were asked to keep their eyes open while a digital clock was presented in the screen (for 6 mins 34 secs). Then, each participant had a semi-structured interview.
The hypothesis is, there is a constitutive relation between the functional dynamics of these large–scale brain networks and these temporal, bodily experiences, which is out of synchrony in schizophrenia patients.
Although the results are not conclusive probably due to the small sample and the linguistic limitations faced, nonetheless two main points of contrast involving the function of the insula and the patterns of synchrony of the triple network were elaborated.
A phenomenological hypothesis is proposed to account for psychosis as a disturbance of the latter relation resulting in a disturbed subjectivity and sense of the body. A framework is proposed in terms of Homeostasis and Allostasis, integrating the functional connectivity dynamics, to account for the psychopathological manifestations.
Funding: Poznan University of Medical Sciences Doctoral School;
STER Internationalisation of Doctoral Schools Programme from;
NAWA Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange No. PPI/STE/2020/1/00014/DEC/02.
