In this study, for the first time, data were obtained on the architecture of effective connections in extended default neural network in patients with schizophrenia and the healthy controls. Also, a determination of the immunological status of patients was performed. At rest, the effective connectomes of the patients and healthy subjects had significant differences in the strength of connections. Immunological data analysis showed that despite clinical improvement after inpatient treatment, most patients had elevated levels of markers of systemic inflammation and activation of humoral immunity. At the next stage of work, a comprehensive analysis of neurophysiological and immunological data is planned.
Emotional dysfunction, including flat affect and emotional perception deficits, is a specific symptom of schizophrenia disorder. We used a modified multimodal odd-ball paradigm with fearful facial expressions accompanied by congruent and non-congruent emotional vocalizations (sounds of women screaming and laughing) to investigate the impairment of emotional perception and reactions to other people’s emotions in schizophrenia. We compared subjective ratings of emotional state and event-related potentials (EPPs) in response to congruent and non-congruent stimuli in patients with schizophrenia and healthy controls. The results showed the altered multimodal perception of fearful stimuli in patients with schizophrenia. The amplitude of N50 was significantly higher for non-congruent stimuli than congruent ones in the control group and did not differ in patients. The P100 and N200 amplitudes were higher in response to non-congruent stimuli in patients than in controls, implying impaired sensory gating in schizophrenia. The observed decrease of P3a and P3b amplitudes in patients could be associated with less attention, less emotional arousal, or incorrect interpretation of emotional valence, as patients differed from healthy controls in the emotion scores of non-congruent stimuli. The difficulties in identifying the incoherence of facial and audial components of emotional expression could be significant in understanding the psychopathology of schizophrenia.
Schizophrenia is a mental disorder characterized by both abnormal time perception and atypical relationships with external factors. Here we compare the influence of external photic stimulation on time production between healthy subjects (n = 24) and patients with schizophrenia (n = 22). To delve into neuropsychological mechanisms of such a relationship, the EEG was recorded during variable conditions: during production of 10 s intervals; during photic stimulation of 4, 9, 16, and 25 Hz; and during combinations of these conditions. We found that the higher frequency of photic stimulation influenced the production of time intervals in healthy volunteers, which became significantly longer and were accompanied by corresponding EEG changes. The impact of photic stimulation was absent in patients with schizophrenia. In addition, the time production was characterized by less accuracy and the absence of EEG dynamics typical for healthy controls that included an increase in alpha2 power and envelope frequency. Our findings indicated that the time perception was not adjusted by external factors in patients with schizophrenia and might have involved cognitive and mental processes different from those of healthy volunteers.
Abstract Paralinguistic features of the speaker, such as prosody, temp, loudness, and dynamics, are an important marker of a person’s emotional state. The deficit of processing of emotional prosody could be preferably associated with the impairments in individuals with ASD’s social behavior. The following two groups of children participated in our study: 30 preschoolers from 4 to 6 years old in the target group (39.1 ± 6.4 scores by Childhood Autism Rating Scale), 24 preschoolers of the control group from 4 to 6 years in the control group. The prosody stimuli were the combination of syllables, said with intonations of “joy,” “angry,” “sadness,” “fear,” and “calm.” Fast Fourier transform (FFT) is used to analyze power spectrum density (PSD). The resulting normalized spectrum was integrated over unit width intervals in the range of interest (2 to 20 Hz with a step in 1Hz). Children with ASD, similarly to TD children, showed the most pronounced differenced of EEG in response to prosodics of fear and anger. The significant groups’ differences in PSD were detected for sad and joy intonations. Indexes of EEG differences between pleasure and painful intonations were significantly higher in the control group than children with ASD and between sadness and calm or joy and calm intonations. This paper makes up two main contributions: In general, we obtained that children with ASD have less response to a human voice’s emotional intonation. The physical characteristics of stimuli are more critical than a sign of emotions. The effect of EEG spectral power has hemisphere specialization in the healthy control group, but not in ASD children. Since spectral power for negative emotions in the target group is higher, we proposed that ASD children worse recognize positive emotions than negative emotions.
This study focused on auditory emotional perception in children with low-functioning autism and investigated the children’s response to emotionally charged nonverbal sounds which regularly induced emotional response in typically developing (TD) peers. An EEG was conducted, and emotional reactions were assessed using analog scales and images of presented sounds with additional images during the presentation of emotional stimuli. The results showed that EEG and emotional responses to the fearful sounds were similar in TD children and children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Both groups of children showed an increase in peak alpha frequency and power of alpha2-band and a decrease in low-frequency bands. Sounds of crying and laughter induced an atypical EEG response in children with ASD, with no change in alpha-band’s power and frequency observed in them; this was contrary to the observation in TD children. The decrease in the fractal dimension detected in children with ASD only for sounds of crying and laughter correlated with the accuracy of assessment of these stimuli.
Despite widespread using electroencephalography (EEG) and Doppler ultrasound in pediatric neurology clinical practice, there are still no well-known correlations between these methods that could contribute to a better understanding of brain processes and development of neurological pathology. This study aims to reveal relationship between EEG and Doppler ultrasound methods. We compared two cohorts of adults and preschool children with no history of neurological or mental diseases. The data analysis included investigation of EEG and carotid blood flow indexes, which are significant in neurological diagnosis, as well as calculation of linear and non-linear EEG parameters and ratios between the systolic peak velocities of carotid arteries and carotid blood asymmetry. We have found age-dependent correlations between EEG and power Doppler ultrasound imaging (PDUI) data. Carotid blood flow asymmetry correlated with delta-rhythm power spectral density only in preschoolers. The ratios of blood flow velocities in the internal carotid arteries to those in the common carotid arteries correlated with higher peak alpha frequency and lower fractal dimension; moreover, they were associated with lower Epworth sleepiness scale scores. The study revealed significant correlations between EEG and PDUI imaging indexes, which are different for healthy children and adults. Despite the fact that the correlations were associated with non-clinical states such as overwork or stress, we assumed that the investigated parameters could be applicable for clinical trials.
The article presents the results of a study of tactile perception. The phenomena of hypersensitivity and hypensensitivity in mental pathology are associated with chenges of reaction rate, thresholds of perception of tactile stimuli, or with physiological characteristics — a change in the tactile receptor system (McGlone F., 2014). This study was performed as an attempt to identify cognitive perception strategies (styles) for the tactile system, as well as their changes in patients with a hallucinatory-paranoid form of schizophrenia. The method, which we called the “tactile pictogram”, was developed to identify tactile perception features. Stimuli: eight textile samples (different fabrics), the same size and shape (A5), but different in structure, density, color and texture. Instruction: We allow the patient to touch the fabtic with closed eyes to feel it (fabrics presented one by one) and tell any words to memorize this fabric. After that, as a test it was necessary to find out the fabric according to your description. Subjects was 45 students (department of psychology), age 20 to 50 years. 24 patients with a hallucinatory-paranoid form of schizophrenia and schizotypic disorder (F20.0, F21.0 in ICD-10) aged 14 to 40 years. Patients at the time of the study were medicated, pathological symptoms persisted. All the received characteristics were combined into categories: “image”, “symbol”, “color and pattern”, “function”, “subjective evaluation”, “affiliation”, “objective evaluation”, “associations by place”, “character”. The answers of the subjects were coded according to the categories, expert assessments were used. The values of the U-test for the intergroup differences p = 0.05 for the categories “image”, “symbol”, “color and pattern”. In general, both healthy and schizophrenics used no more than three perception strategies. Some samples have recognizable features (cotton) and do not differ in characteristics in patients and healthy. Conclusions: 1. For tissue samples: cotton, fine viscose and thin felt for both groups, no differences between groups are revealed; 2. Intergroup differences in other samples showed a predominance of associative strategies in patients with schizophrenia (compared to healthy ones).
To restore and determine the localization of rich-club areas, patients with a diagnosis of schizophrenia and conditionally healthy volunteers underwent diffusion MRI.According to diffusion MRI, structural connectomas were restored, after which the connectivity matrices of the brain regions with each other were calculated based on AAL atlas.
