Violence-related PTSD and neural activation when seeing emotionally charged male-female interactions

Dominik A Moser; Tatjana Aue; Francesca Suardi; Hana Kutlikova; Maria I Cordero; Ana Sancho Rossignol; Nicolas Favez; Sandra Rusconi Serpa; Daniel S Schechter

doi:10.1093/scan/nsu099

Violence-related PTSD and neural activation when seeing emotionally charged male-female interactions

Soc Cogn Affect Neurosci. 2015 May;10(5):645-53. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsu099. Epub 2014 Jul 25.

Authors

Dominik A Moser¹, Tatjana Aue², Francesca Suardi³, Hana Kutlikova², Maria I Cordero³, Ana Sancho Rossignol², Nicolas Favez², Sandra Rusconi Serpa³, Daniel S Schechter³

Affiliations

¹ Faculty of Psychology and Education, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of Geneva Hospitals and Faculty of Medicine, Geneva, Switzerland, Swiss Center for Affective Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Faculty of Health, Psychology and Social Care, Manchester Metropolitan University, and Faculty of Medicine, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland Faculty of Psychology and Education, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of Geneva Hospitals and Faculty of Medicine, Geneva, Switzerland, Swiss Center for Affective Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Faculty of Health, Psychology and Social Care, Manchester Metropolitan University, and Faculty of Medicine, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland dominik.moser@unige.ch.
² Faculty of Psychology and Education, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of Geneva Hospitals and Faculty of Medicine, Geneva, Switzerland, Swiss Center for Affective Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Faculty of Health, Psychology and Social Care, Manchester Metropolitan University, and Faculty of Medicine, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland.
³ Faculty of Psychology and Education, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of Geneva Hospitals and Faculty of Medicine, Geneva, Switzerland, Swiss Center for Affective Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Faculty of Health, Psychology and Social Care, Manchester Metropolitan University, and Faculty of Medicine, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland Faculty of Psychology and Education, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of Geneva Hospitals and Faculty of Medicine, Geneva, Switzerland, Swiss Center for Affective Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland, Faculty of Health, Psychology and Social Care, Manchester Metropolitan University, and Faculty of Medicine, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland.

Abstract

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a disorder that involves impaired regulation of the fear response to traumatic reminders. This study tested how women with male-perpetrated interpersonal violence-related PTSD (IPV-PTSD) differed in their brain activation from healthy controls (HC) when exposed to scenes of male-female interaction of differing emotional content. Sixteen women with symptoms of IPV-PTSD and 19 HC participated in this study. During magnetic resonance imaging, participants watched a stimulus protocol of 23 different 20 s silent epochs of male-female interactions taken from feature films, which were neutral, menacing or prosocial. IPV-PTSD participants compared with HC showed (i) greater dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC) and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) activation in response to menacing vs prosocial scenes and (ii) greater anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), right hippocampus activation and lower ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) activty in response to emotional vs neutral scenes. The fact that IPV-PTSD participants compared with HC showed lower activity of the ventral ACC during emotionally charged scenes regardless of the valence of the scenes suggests that impaired social perception among IPV-PTSD patients transcends menacing contexts and generalizes to a wider variety of emotionally charged male-female interactions.

Keywords: Parental PTSD; emotion regulation; fMRI; human interaction; interpersonal violence.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Adult
Domestic Violence / psychology
Emotions / physiology*
Female
Hippocampus / physiopathology
Humans
Interpersonal Relations*
Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Male
Mothers / psychology
Photic Stimulation
Prefrontal Cortex / physiopathology
Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic / psychology*
Violence / psychology*
Young Adult