title: Interaction between a history of depression and rumination on neural response to emotional faces.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Both past depressive episodes and the personality trait of depressive rumination are strong risk factors for future depression. Depression is associated with abnormal emotional processing, which may be a neurobiological marker for vulnerability to depression. A consistent picture has yet to emerge as to how a history of depression and the tendency to ruminate influence emotional processing. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between rumination, past depression and neural responses when processing face emotions.
  
  
  METHODS
  The Ruminative Responses Scale (RRS) was completed by 30 remitted depressives and 37 controls who underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanning while viewing happy, sad, fearful and neutral faces.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The remitted depressives showed overall reductions in neural responses to negative emotions relative to the controls. However, in the remitted depressives, but not the controls, RRS scores were correlated with increased neural responses to negative emotions and decreased responses to happiness in limbic regions.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Automatic emotion processing biases and rumination seem to be correlated to aspects of vulnerability to depression. However, remission from depression may be maintained by a general suppression of limbic responsiveness to negative emotion.
authors.affiliation: Neuroscience and Psychiatry Unit, University of Manchester and Manchester Academic Health Science Centre, UK. emma.j.thomas@manchester.ac.uk
authors.forename: E J
authors.initials: EJ
authors.lastname: Thomas
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Elliott
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: McKie
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Arnone
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Downey
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Juhasz
authors.forename: J F W
authors.initials: JF
authors.lastname: Deakin
authors.forename: I M
authors.initials: IM
authors.lastname: Anderson
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D003866:Depressive Disorder / Q000523:psychology*; D004644:Emotions; D005149:Facial Expression; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D008606:Mental Processes; D009434:Neural Pathways / Q000503:physiopathology; D012307:Risk Factors