title: Abnormal, affect-specific modulatory effects on early auditory processing in schizophrenia: magnetoencephalographic evidence.
abstract: Abnormalities in the perception and identification of emotions have frequently been reported in schizophrenia. Hemodynamic neuroimaging studies found functional abnormalities in cortical and subcortical brain circuits that are involved in normal affective processing, but the temporal dynamics of abnormal emotion processing in schizophrenia remain largely elusive. To investigate this issue, we recorded early auditory evoked field components by means of whole-head magnetoencephalography that were in response to emotion-associated tones in seventeen patients with schizophrenia and in seventeen healthy, matched controls. Forty-two click-like tones (conditioned stimuli; CS) acquired differential emotional meaning through an affective associative learning procedure by pairing each CS three times with either pleasant, unpleasant or neutral auditory scenes. As expected, differential affect-specific modulation in patients vs. controls was evident, starting at the auditory N1m onset latency of approximately 70ms, extending to 230ms. While controls showed the expected enhanced processing of emotion associated CS, patients revealed an inverted pattern with reduced processing of arousal, when compared to neutral stimuli, in the right prefrontal cortex. The present finding suggests impairments in the prioritization of emotionally salient vs. non-salient stimuli in patients with schizophrenia. Dysfunction in higher cognitive processes and behavior in schizophrenia may therefore reflect dysfunction in fundamental, early emotion processing stages.
authors.affiliation: Institute for Biomagnetism and Biosignalanalysis, University Hospital Münster, D-48149 Münster, Germany.
authors.forename: Markus
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Junghöfer
authors.affiliation: Institute for Biomagnetism and Biosignalanalysis, University Hospital Münster, D-48149 Münster, Germany.
authors.forename: Ann-Kathrin
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Bröckelmann
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, University Münster, D-48149 Münster, Germany.
authors.forename: Kerstin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Küppers
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, School of Medicine, University of Münster, D-48149 Münster, Germany.
authors.forename: Patricia
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Ohrmann
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, University Münster, D-48149 Münster, Germany; Department of Psychology, Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, University Kiel, D-24118 Kiel, Germany. Electronic address: pedersen@psychologie.uni-kiel.de.
authors.forename: Anya
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Pedersen
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000328:Adult; D001245:Association Learning / Q000502:physiology; D001307:Auditory Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D001921:Brain / Q000503:physiopathology*; D003213:Conditioning, Psychological / Q000502:physiology; D004644:Emotions / Q000502:physiology*; D005072:Evoked Potentials, Auditory / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015225:Magnetoencephalography; D008297:Male; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000503:physiopathology*
keywords: Affective conditioning; Auditory N1; IADS; MEG; MMN; Mismatch Negativity; Multi CS conditioning