Enhanced subgenual cingulate response to altruistic decisions in remitted major depressive disorder.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is associated with functional abnormalities in fronto-meso-limbic networks contributing to decision-making, affective and reward processing impairments. Such functional disturbances may underlie a tendency for enhanced altruism driven by empathy-based guilt observed in some patients. However, despite the relevance of altruistic decisions to understanding vulnerability, as well as everyday psychosocial functioning, in MDD, their functional neuroanatomy is unknown.

Methods

Using a charitable donations experiment with fMRI, we compared 14 medication-free participants with fully remitted MDD and 15 demographically-matched control participants without MDD.

Results

Compared with the control group, the remitted MDD group exhibited e

SUBMITTER: Pulcu E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4053655 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature