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Functional neuroimaging of emotionally intense autobiographical memories in post-traumatic stress disorder

journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-08, 19:39 authored by Peggy L St Jacques, Anne Botzung, Amanda Miles, David C Rubin
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) affects regions that support autobiographical memory (AM) retrieval, such as the hippocampus, amygdala and ventral medial prefrontal cortex (PFC). However, it is not well understood how PTSD may impact the neural mechanisms of memory retrieval for the personal past. We used a generic cue method combined with parametric modulation analysis and functional MRI (fMRI) to investigate the neural mechanisms affected by PTSD symptoms during the retrieval of a large sample of emotionally intense AMs. There were three main results. First, the PTSD group showed greater recruitment of the amygdala/hippocampus during the construction of negative versus positive emotionally intense AMs, when compared to controls. Second, across both the construction and elaboration phases of retrieval the PTSD group showed greater recruitment of the ventral medial PFC for negatively intense memories, but less recruitment for positively intense memories. Third, the PTSD group showed greater functional coupling between the ventral medial PFC and the amygdala for negatively intense memories, but less coupling for positively intense memories. In sum, the fMRI data suggest that there was greater recruitment and coupling of emotional brain regions during the retrieval of negatively intense AMs in the PTSD group when compared to controls.

History

Publication status

  • Published

Journal

Journal of Psychiatric Research

ISSN

0022-3956

Publisher

Elsevier

Issue

5

Volume

45

Page range

630-637

Department affiliated with

  • Psychology Publications

Full text available

  • No

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2015-01-21

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