title: Alerted default mode: functional connectivity changes in the aftermath of social stress.
abstract: Stress affects the brain at a network level: the salience network is supposedly upregulated, while at the same time the executive control network is downregulated. While theoretically described, the effects in the aftermath of stress have thus far not been tested empirically. Here, we compared for the first time resting-state functional connectivity in a large sample of healthy volunteers before and after a mild social stressor. Following the theoretical prediction, we focused on connectivity of the salience network (SN), the executive control network (ECN) and the default mode network (DMN). The DMN exhibited increased resting-state functional connectivity following the cyberball task to the key nodes of the SN, namely the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and the anterior insula, as well as sensorimotor regions and higher-order visual areas. We conclude that this increased connectivity of the DMN with key nodes of the SN and regions responsible for preparatory motor activity and visual motion processing indicates a shift towards an 'alerted default mode' in the aftermath of stress. This brain response may be triggered or aggravated by (social) stress induced by the cyberball task, enabling individuals to better reorient attention, detect salient external stimuli, and deal with the emotional and affective consequences of stress.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Medical School, RWTH Aachen University, Pauwelsstrasse 30, 52074 Aachen, Germany.
authors.forename: Benjamin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Clemens
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Medical School, RWTH Aachen University, Pauwelsstrasse 30, 52074 Aachen, Germany.
authors.forename: Lisa
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Wagels
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Medical School, RWTH Aachen University, Pauwelsstrasse 30, 52074 Aachen, Germany.
authors.forename: Magdalena
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bauchmüller
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Medical School, RWTH Aachen University, Pauwelsstrasse 30, 52074 Aachen, Germany.
authors.forename: Rene
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Bergs
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Medical School, RWTH Aachen University, Pauwelsstrasse 30, 52074 Aachen, Germany.|Jülich Aachen Research Alliance (JARA) - Translational Brain Medicine, Aachen, Germany.|Institute of Neuroscience and Medicine, Computational and Systems Neuroscience (INM-6), Wilhelm-Johnen-Straße, 52425 Jülich, Germany.
authors.forename: Ute
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Habel
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, Medical School, RWTH Aachen University, Pauwelsstrasse 30, 52074 Aachen, Germany.|Radboudumc, Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Department for Cognitive Neuroscience, Kapittelweg 29, 6525 EN Nijmegen, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Nils
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Kohn
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D001931:Brain Mapping; D063132:Connectome; D056344:Executive Function; D005260:Female; D064368:Healthy Volunteers; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D009415:Nerve Net / Q000502:physiology*; D013315:Stress, Psychological; D055815:Young Adult