A Study On The Relationship Between Facial Emotional Cognition And Brain Structural Magnetic Resonance In Patients With First-episode Schizophrenia

Part? White matter abnormalities as a neural correlate of facial emotoion perception deficts in drug-na?ve patients with first-episode schizophreniaObjective: To explore white matter abnormalities in drug-na?ve patients with first-episode schizophrenia and the relationship between facial emotion perception and white matter integrity.Methods: Sixty-three schizophrenic patients and thirty control subjects underwent diffusion tensor imaging(DTI)scans and were examined for facial emotion perception abilities by using the Facial Emotion Categorization.Voxel-based analysis was used to to investigate regional fractional anisotropy(FA)alterations.The correlation between impaired facial emotion perception and FA alterations was examined in patients using voxel-wise correlation analysis within brain areas that showed a significant FA alterations in patients compared with controls.Results: Compared with controls,first-episode schizophrenia patients showed overal decreased FA in white matter of the body of left ventral front lobe,right supramarginal gyrus,left middle occipital gyrus,right middle occipital gyral,left fusiform gyrus,left cerebellum anterior lobe,right parahippocampa gyrus,left anterior cingulate,left extra-nuclear,right thalamus,left thalamus,and right caudate.The patients with schizophrenia were reported a higher shift point and a steeper slope than control subjects in facial emotion dategorization.Correlational analyses revealed that the negative correlation between the slope and negative factor,the negative correlation between positive factor the FA value in white matter of the right middle occipital gyrus and the left middle occipital gyral,the positive correlation between disorganized/concrete factor and the FA value in the right parahippocampal gyrus and the negative correlation between the FA value in the left cerebellum anterior lobe and shift point.Conclusion: There are extensive microstructural abnormalities in white matter of patients with first-episode schizophrenia.Disrupted white matter integrity in these regions may constitute a potential neural pathological basis for the facial emotion perception impairments in schizophrenia.Part? Gray Matter Volume as a neural correlate of facial emotoion perception deficts in drug-na?ve patients with first-episode schizophreniaObjective: Impaired ability to understand and interpret the facial expressions of others(facial emotion perception)is a core feature of schizophrenia which may lead to social dysfunction.In this study,in order to better understand the neurobiological basis underlying facial emotion perception deficts in schizophrenia,we investigated regional structural brain abnormalities and facial emotion perception abilities in drug-na?ve patients with first-episode schizophrenia,and examined the relationship between them.Methods: Fifty-two schizophrenic patients and 29 group-matched healthy controls underwent magnetic resonance imaging and were examined for facial emotion perception abilities by using the Facial Emotion Categorization.Voxel-based morphometry(VBM)was performed to investigate regional grey matter volume alterations.The correlation between impaired facial emotion perception and grey matter volume alterations was examined in patients using voxel-wise correlation analysis within brain areas that showed a significant grey matter volume alterations in patients compared with controls.Results: Relative to the healthy controls,schizophrenia patients exhibited gray matter reductions in the superior temporal gyrus,middle occipital gyrus,parahippocampa gyrus,posterior cingulate,the culmen of cerebellum anterior lobe,cerebellar tonsil,and the declive of cerebellum posterior lobe.The schizophrenic patients performed differently on facial emotion perception tasks because the shift point and slope were both different from the controls.Importantly,abnormal performance on facial emotion perception was found to be associated with reductions in gray matter in the culmen of cerebellum anterior lobe of the patient group.Conclusions: This study suggests that reduced grey matter volume in the culmen of cerebellum anterior lobe constitutes a potential neural basis for the facial emotion perception impairments in schizophrenia.