Researches On Eysenck’s Personality Based On Voxel-based Morphometry And Structural Network

Personality is the particular combination of emotional, attitudinal, and behavioral response patterns of an individual. The Eysenck’s personality traits include four dimensions, namely, extraversion, neuroticism, psychoticism, and lie. By utilizing the structural magnetic resonance imaging(sMRI) and diffusion tensor imaging(DTI), this study aimed to explore the brain structure and the brain network in healthy young people. We primarily aimed to understand the neurostructural foundations of the human personality, to examine whether or not the brain regions are related to personality traits. In addition, we adopted the method of graph theoretical analysis to investigate the brain structural network, to determine whether the topological properties in healthy individuals could predict Eysenck’s personality characteristics. The main contents are:1、Using a voxel-based morphometry method to explore the relationship between personality and gray matter volume in healthy young adults. Our results showed that extraversion was negatively correlated with GMV in the bilateral amygdala, parahippocampal gyrus, right middle temporal gyrus, and left superior frontal gyrus, all of which are involved in emotional and social cognitive processes. These results might suggest an association between extraversion and affective processing. In addition, a positive correlation was detected between neuroticism and GMV of the right cerebellum, a key brain region for negative affect coordination. Meanwhile, a negative association was revealed in the left superior frontal gyrus in neuroticism. These results may prove that neuroticism is related to several brain regions involved in regulating negative emotions. Based on these findings, we concluded that brain regions involved in social cognition and affective process account for modulation and shaping of personality traits among young individuals. The results of this study may serve as a basis for elucidating the anatomical factors of personality.2、Using diffusion tensor imaging method to construct brain structural connectivity network of healthy participants. Graph theory analysis was employed to explore whether or not there were correlations between the topology properties of the network and the Eysenck’s personality. Our results suggested that neuroticism was positively associated with betweenness centrality in the left middle frontal gyrus, and psychoticism was found to be positively related with betweenness centrality in the left fusiform gyrus. In addition, our findings also showed that the psychoticism was positively correlated with clustering coefficient in the left amygdala, meanwhile, the minimum path length was negative related with psychoticism in the left inferior temporal gyrus, these findings may indicate that personality traits were associated with work efficiency of brain regions involving feelings and emotional processing. The results of this study illuminated a relationship between personality traits and topological properties of brain structural network.