title: Abnormality of Auditory Mismatch Negativity in Depression and Its Dependence on Stimulus Intensity.
abstract: Mismatch negativity (MMN) is thought to reveal several abnormalities of cognitive functioning. Although depression often affects cognitive functioning, previous studies concerning MMN in depressed patients provided conflicting results. In recent reports, it has been suggested that depressed patients may show abnormal auditory response to regular auditory stimuli presented with at a relatively high intensity. We thus recorded acoustic MMN in 16 drug-free patients suffering from moderate depression and in 10 healthy subjects at 2 different stimulus intensities. Differences in MMN latency and amplitude between depressed patients and healthy subjects reached the significance level only for high intensity stimulation, and they were consistent with a dysfunction of frontal MMN subcomponents in depressed patients. This finding suggests that consistent MMN abnormalities can be observed in depressed patients by using high-intensity stimulation; moreover, it supports the hypothesis of disturbances of frontal networks in depression even in early stages of disease.
authors.affiliation: Department of Geriatrics, Neurosciences & Orthopedics, Unit of Neurophysiopathology and Sleep Medicine, Catholic University, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Domenico
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Restuccia
authors.affiliation: Department of Geriatrics, Neurosciences & Orthopedics, Unit of Neurophysiopathology and Sleep Medicine, Catholic University, Rome, Italy lvol@libero.it.
authors.forename: Catello
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Vollono
authors.affiliation: Department of Geriatrics, Neurosciences & Orthopedics, Unit of Neurophysiopathology and Sleep Medicine, Catholic University, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Lorenzo
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Scaloni
authors.affiliation: Emergency Medicine, Santa Chiara Hospital, Trento, Italy.
authors.forename: Francesco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Buccelletti
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychiatry and Psychology, Catholic University, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Giovanni
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Camardese
mesh_terms: D000161:Acoustic Stimulation; D000328:Adult; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000503:physiopathology; D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000523:psychology; D003865:Major Depressive Disorder / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000523:psychology; D004569:Electroencephalography; D005072:Evoked Potentials, Auditory / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged
keywords: depression; event-related potentials; frontal cortex; mismatch negativity; serotonin