title: Saccadic Eye Movements in Anorexia Nervosa.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Anorexia Nervosa (AN) has a mortality rate among the highest of any mental illness, though the factors involved in the condition remain unclear. Recently, the potential neurobiological underpinnings of the condition have become of increasing interest. Saccadic eye movement tasks have proven useful in our understanding of the neurobiology of some other psychiatric illnesses as they utilise known brain regions, but to date have not been examined in AN. The aim of this study was to investigate whether individuals with AN differ from healthy individuals in performance on a range of saccadic eye movements tasks.
  
  
  METHODS
  24 females with AN and 25 healthy individuals matched for age, gender and premorbid intelligence participated in the study. Participants were required to undergo memory-guided and self-paced saccade tasks, and an interleaved prosaccade/antisaccade/no-go saccade task while undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).
  
  
  RESULTS
  AN participants were found to make prosaccades of significantly shorter latency than healthy controls. AN participants also made an increased number of inhibitory errors on the memory-guided saccade task. Groups did not significantly differ in antisaccade, no-go saccade or self-paced saccade performance, or fMRI findings.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The results suggest a potential role of GABA in the superior colliculus in the psychopathology of AN.
authors.affiliation: Department of Optometry & Vision Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.|Department of Psychiatry, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.|Department of Mental Health, The Austin Hospital, Heidelberg, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Phillipou
authors.affiliation: Brain and Psychological Sciences Research Centre, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorne, Victoria, Australia.|Monash Alfred Psychiatry Research Centre, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, Australia.|Department of Psychiatry, St Vincent's Hospital, Fitzroy, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Susan Lee
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Rossell
authors.affiliation: Monash Alfred Psychiatry Research Centre, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Caroline
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Gurvich
authors.affiliation: Brain and Psychological Sciences Research Centre, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorne, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Matthew Edward
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Hughes
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, St Vincent's Hospital, Fitzroy, Victoria, Australia.|Department of Psychiatry, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.|Faculty of Health Sciences, Australian Catholic University, Fitzroy, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: David Jonathan
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: Castle
authors.affiliation: Brain and Psychological Sciences Research Centre, Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorne, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Richard Grant
authors.initials: RG
authors.lastname: Nibbs
authors.affiliation: Department of Optometry & Vision Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Larry Allen
authors.initials: LA
authors.lastname: Abel
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000856:Anorexia Nervosa / Q000503:physiopathology*; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D012438:Saccades; D055815:Young Adult