Effects of depression on sensory/motor vs. central processing in visual mental imagery (original) (raw)
Related papers
Motor Imagery in Unipolar Major Depression
Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 2014
Background: Motor imagery is a potential tool to investigate action representation, as it can provide insights into the processes of action planning and preparation. Recent studies suggest that depressed patients present specific impairment in mental rotation. The present study was designed to investigate the influence of unipolar depression on motor imagery ability.
Fine motor retardation and depression
Journal of Psychiatric Research, 1996
New computerized techniques allow the precise measurement of psychomotor retardation in patients with a major depressive episode (MDE). One such technique is the analysis of writing and drawing behaviour during figure copying tasks. In the present study, 22 inpatients with an MDE were compared to 22 normal controls. Three tasks were used: the drawing of lines and simple figures, the copying of complex figures and a task in which figures had to be rotated. Objectives were to provide support for earlier findings that the patients were slower than the controls and to explore the cognitive and motor processes involved. Two strategies were applied: analysis of the reaction time and movement time and their different components, and manipulation of the cognitive and motor demands. Patients showed considerable retardation with most of the kinematic variables. Motor deficits and cognitive slowing down contributed to this retardation. Cognitive difficulties increased with increasing complexity of the task. Copyright (• 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd.
Motor Imagery in Bipolar Depression With Slowed Movement
The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 2013
We hypothesized that motor retardation in bipolar depression is mediated by disruption of the pre-executive stages of motor production. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging to investigate neural activity during motor imagery and motor execution to elucidate whether brain regions that mediate planning, preparation, and control of movement are activated differently in subjects with bipolar depression (n = 9) compared with healthy controls (n = 12). We found significant between-group differences. During motor imagery, the patients activated the posterior medial parietal cortex, the posterior cingulate cortex, the premotor cortex, the prefrontal cortex, and the frontal poles more than the controls did. Activation in the brain areas involved in motor selection, planning, and preparation was altered. In addition, limbic and prefrontal regions associated with self-reference and the default mode network were altered during motor imagery in bipolar depression with motor retardation.
Retardation in depression: assessment by means of simple motor tasks
Journal of Affective Disorders, 1999
Background: psychomotor retardation in depression has mostly been assessed with tasks requiring both cognitive and motor processes. This study tested whether retardation could be measured if the cognitive demands of the task were minimal. Methods: 30 inpatients with a major depressive episode were compared one week after the start of antidepressant treatment, to 30 healthy control persons, matched for age, sex and educational level. Tests consisted of ten simple drawing tasks. The kinematics of drawing movements were recorded using a specially designed pen, a graphics tablet and a personal computer. Results: patients showed marked motor slowing on all the tasks: longer movement durations, longer pauses and lower velocities. Conclusions: psychomotor retardation in depressed patients treated with antidepressants occurs during drawing tasks, in which the cognitive demands are minimal and less than those required in the figure copying tasks used in our previous studies. Limitations: the use of co-medication can have influenced the results, although no correlations were found between the use of medication and the kinematic variables. Clinical relevance: detailed registration and analysis of drawing movements enable a more precise diagnosis of psychomotor disturbances in depressed patients.
Mental imagery in depression: Phenomenology, potential mechanisms, and treatment implications
Mental imagery is an experience like perception in the absence of a percept. It is a ubiquitous feature of human cognition, yet has been relatively neglected in the etiology, maintenance, and treatment of depression. Imagery abnormalities in depression include an excess of intrusive negative mental imagery; impoverished positive imagery; observer perspective imagery; and overgeneral memory, in which specific imagery is lacking. We consider the contribution of imagery dysfunctions to depressive psychopathology, and implications for cognitive-behavioural interventions. Treatment advances capitalising on the representational format of imagery (as opposed to its content) are reviewed, including imagery rescripting, positive imagery generation, and memory specificity training. Considering mental imagery can contribute to clinical assessment and imagery-focussed psychological therapeutic techniques, and promote investigation of underlying mechanisms for treatment innovation. Research into mental imagery in depression is at an early stage. Investigation of imagery-related mechanisms by bridging clinical psychology and neuroscience is recommended.
Journal of Evidence-Based Psychotherapies
The high rate of recurrence and residual symptoms of depression continuously motivate the search for new treatments addressing this challenging condition. In this single-case study, we reported the application of a cognitive rehabilitation skills training based on remote kinematics as a treatment for residual depression by targeting deficits of mental simulations of action. We found that the administration of Kinect-based rehabilitation training resulted in important improvements showed by significant mean baseline reductions (MBLR) of difficulty in imagining positive actions (MBLR= 54 %), negative emotions (MBLR = 36.3 %), cognitive flexibility (MBLR= 69.7 %), depressive symptoms (MBLR= 80%), and physical retardation (MBLR= 50 %). Similarly, improvements in positive affect (MBLR = 107 %) and vividness of motor imagery for positive actions were registered (MBLR= 100 %). We also found unique effects of our intervention such as reports of involuntary action simulations to distant stim...
Major depressive disorder alters perception of emotional body movements
Frontiers in psychiatry, 2014
Much recent research has shown an association between mood disorders and an altered emotion perception. However, these studies were conducted mainly with stimuli such as faces. This is the first study to examine possible differences in how people with major depressive disorder (MDD) and healthy controls perceive emotions expressed via body movements. Thirty patients with MDD and thirty healthy controls observed the video scenes of human interactions conveyed by point-light displays (PLDs). They rated the depicted emotions and judged their confidence in their rating. Results showed that patients with MDD rated the depicted interactions more negatively than healthy controls. They also rated interactions with negative emotionality as being more intense and were more confident in their ratings. It is concluded that patients with MDD exhibit an altered emotion perception compared to healthy controls when rating emotions expressed via body movements depicted in PLDs.
Reliance on external cues during serial sequential movement in major depression
Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry, 2000
Maintenance of motor set in patients with unipolar major depression was examined. Twelve melancholic and 12 nonmelancholic depressed patients and 24 age matched controls performed a serial choice reaction time task while external cues aiding maintenance of a motor set were systematically removed. Melancholic patients were significantly slower than controls with no reduction in external cues and with a moderate reduction in external cues. At a high level of reduction in external cues, seven of 12 melancholic patients (but only three of 12 nonmelancholic patients and controls) were unable to complete the task; suggesting a greater reliance on external cues, perhaps implicating a failure of motor planning ability in melancholic patients. This, in turn, may point to a prefrontal (premotor) deficit in melancholic depression, with possible commonalities with Parkinson's disease. (J Neurol Neurosurg Psychiatry 2000;69:237-239)
Neural correlates of disbalanced motor control in major depression
Journal of Affective Disorders, 2012
Background: Motor retardation is a common symptom of major depressive disorder (MDD). Despite the existence of various assessment methods, little is known on the pathobiology of motor retardation. We aimed to elucidate aspects of motor control investigating the association of objective motor activity and resting state cerebral blood flow (CBF). Methods: Nineteen control subjects and 20 MDD patients were investigated using arterial spin labeling (ASL) at 3 T in the morning to quantify resting state CBF. Afterwards wrist actigraphy was recorded for 24 h. CBF, group and activity level (AL) were entered into a whole brain general linear model. Results: MDD patients had reduced AL. Both groups had linear associations of AL and CBF in bilateral rostral prefrontal cortex. Groups differed in four clusters associated with motor control. In controls a positive association was found in the left caudal cingulate zone (CCZ) and an inverse association in the right external globus pallidus (GPe). MDD patients had positive associations in the right orbitofrontal cortex and inverse associations in the left supplemental motor area. Limitations: Patients were on antidepressant medication. Conclusions: The pattern of associations between CBF and AL suggest disbalanced motor control in MDD. Findings are in line with the hypothesis of dopamine deficits contributing to motor retardation in MDD.
World Journal of Biological Psychiatry, 2009
Background. Reduced dopaminergic transmission has been implicated in the pathophysiology of major depression. Furthermore, dopaminergic neurotransmission plays an important role in the physiology of visual contrast sensitivity (CS). To test the hypothesis that altered dopaminergic neurotransmission plays a role in major depression we measured contrast sensitivity in patients with major depression and in healthy control subjects. Methods. Twenty-eight patients diagnosed with major depressive disorder were compared to 21 age-matched control subjects on their ability to detect a Gabor target with slightly elevated luminance contrast embedded in seven equi-contrast distracters. Results. Contrast discrimination thresholds were significantly elevated in unmedicated and medicated patients with major depression compared to control subjects, at all pedestal contrast levels tested. Conclusions. Contrast discrimination performance is reduced in depressive patients and might reflect a state of altered dopaminergic neurotransmission.