Alpha psychiatry最新文献

Background: Depression has a substantial impact on adolescents' mental health. This study investigated adolescents' use of conceptual metaphors to convey their experiences with depression and analyzed the role of image schemas in structuring their metaphorical conceptualization of the condition. The objective was to elucidate the cognitive mechanisms underlying the framing of depression.

Methods: Based on the metaphorical expressions from interview data collected from 20 adolescents (aged 15 to 19) diagnosed with depression, this study conducted conceptual metaphor and image schema analyses of narrative discourse related to depression.

Results: The analyses revealed that CONTAINER, THING, PHYSICAL ENTITY, and LOCATION metaphors were primarily used to conceptualize the disorder itself, life with depression, communication and personal environment, medication and therapy, as well as moods, thoughts, and emotions. These metaphors illuminated participants' concerns and challenges in their lived experiences with depression. Furthermore, image schemas such as CONTAINER, PATH, COMPULSION, ENABLEMENT, and VERTICALITY were frequently employed as subjects metaphorically reasoned about their experiences with depression.

Conclusions: The analyses of conceptual metaphors and image schemas in narrative discourse revealed that adolescents tend to draw on bodily experiences to metaphorically interpret their lived experiences of depression. Mental health professionals may benefit from paying closer attention to the image schemas and metaphorical expressions used by patients with depression when assessing their mental health condition.

Objective: Borderline personality disorder (BPD) frequently co-occurs with affective disorders, such as major depressive disorder (MDD) and bipolar disorder (BD), yet the structure of BPD symptoms within these populations remains insufficiently characterized. This study utilizes network analysis to investigate the network structure of BPD symptoms in individuals with affective disorders.

Methods: This study included 1323 participants: 783 individuals with affective disorders (MDD [n = 245], BD I [n = 120], BD II [n = 418]) and 540 controls without a history of psychiatric disorders. BPD symptoms were assessed using the Personality Assessment Inventory-Borderline Features Scale. A Gaussian graphical model was estimated using partial correlations among BPD symptoms, in which nodes correspond to individual symptoms and edges represent the relationships between them. Centrality analysis was subsequently conducted to compute strength, closeness, and betweenness centrality, providing insights into the relative importance and connectivity of individual symptoms within the network.

Results: Analysis identified five distinct communities of BPD symptoms. The symptom "Feel empty" emerged as the most central trait across the affective disorder subgroups and the control group. Network comparison tests indicated no significant differences in network structure among the clinical subgroups, whereas a significant divergence was observed between the clinical and control groups.

Conclusion: This study demonstrates that, although the symptom networks of BPD were largely comparable across affective disorder subgroups, structural differences emerged between the clinical and control groups. Notably, "Feel empty" consistently appeared as the most central symptom across all groups. These findings highlight the relevance of targeting "Feel empty" as a key focus for clinical intervention in affective disorders.

Background and objectives: Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), while representing the most frequently diagnosed and treated condition in child and adolescent psychiatry, continues to be underrecognized and inadequately managed in adult populations. Numerous studies have explored how ADHD may be connected to the immune system and inflammatory processes. These studies have focused particularly on ADHD, stress, anxiety and immune dysregulation. High Mobility Group Box 1 (HMGB1), a nuclear transcription factor and a late-phase mediator of inflammation, has been found to be elevated in various neuropsychiatric conditions. This study aimed to elucidate the potential contribution of inflammatory mechanisms to the pathophysiology of ADHD by quantifying HMGB1 levels.

Materials and methods: 43 ADHD patients and 42 controls with an age between 18-65 years were enrolled. Patients with any acute or chronic psychiatric disease, chronic inflammatory or autoimmune disease, substance addiction, malignancy, severe systemic disease, schizophrenia, mental retardation, a history of surgery or head trauma in the last 6 months and who were on vitamin or fish oil supplements or steroids were excluded. Blood samples were obtained and HMGB1 was measured with Enzyme-Linked Immuno Sorbent Assay method.

Results: The two groups exhibited comparable sociodemographic characteristics. HMGB1 levels were significantly higher in ADHD group than controls (967.5 ± 462.0 ng/mL vs 693.4 ± 366.9 ng/mL, p = 0.003).

Conclusion: In our study, the finding that HMGB1 serum levels were higher in adult ADHD patients compared to healthy controls supports the hypothesis that chronic low-grade inflammation, which is both driven and detected by HMGB1, may be associated with ADHD through the possibility of causing neurodevelopmental disorders. It is known that HMGB1 is effective in the diagnosis and prognosis of immune system diseases. Therefore, our results show that HMGB1 may be related to the pathophysiology of ADHD.

Background: Mental disorders (MDs) are associated with prostate cancer (PCa) outcomes, but the results reported by different studies are inconsistent. Our aim was to explore the causal relationship between 10 MDs and PCa using bidirectional two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) and multivariable MR (MVMR) analysis.

Methods: Our study was based on summary data from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of PCa and 10 major MDs in the European population. The genetic locus data used in the analysis included variants associated with PCa and the 10 MDs. Causal estimates were calculated using the inverse-variance weighted (IVW) method, and sensitivity MR techniques, including Cochran's Q test, MR-Egger regression, and MR pleiotropy residual sum and outlier (MR-PRESSO), were employed to evaluate potential horizontal pleiotropy and heterogeneity. All statistical analyses were conducted using R software.

Results: Our study did not find a causal relationship between PCa and the 10 MDs. In reverse MR analysis, a causal association between insomnia and PCa was found only for insomnia, which reduced PCa risk (odds ratio [OR], 0.9706; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.9468-0.9951; p = 0.0188). However, after MVMR adjustment for habits (cigarette smoking, alcohol intake, coffee intake, and tea intake), this causal relationship no longer existed (OR, 1.011; 95% CI, 0.932-1.096; p = 0.795).

Conclusion: This study demonstrated a negative correlation between insomnia and PCa from a genetic perspective. However, such results may be mediated by lifestyle habits and therefore need to be interpreted with caution.

Objective: This study examined the relationships between socioeconomic status (SES), depression, and cognitive function in older adults, with a focus on the mediating or moderating role of depression in the link between SES and cognitive function.

Methods: Data were analyzed from 5527 participants in the Anhui Healthy Longevity Survey (AHLS). SES was determined by educational attainment and individual annual income; depressive symptoms were assessed using the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9); and cognitive function was evaluated with the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE). Linear regression analyses were conducted to investigate the relationships among SES, depressive symptoms, and cognitive function. The PROCESS macro in SPSS was utilized to perform both mediation and moderation analyses, following established procedures.

Results: Compared to low SES, both medium SES (B = 4.115, p < 0.001) and high SES (B = 6.827, p < 0.001) were both positively associated with MMSE scores and negatively associated with PHQ-9 scores (B = -0.827, p < 0.001; and B = -1.695 -0.195, p < 0.001, respectively). Moreover, PHQ-9 scores were negatively associated with MMSE scores (B = -0.132, p < 0.001). Further analysis revealed that PHQ-9 scores partially mediated the relationship between SES and MMSE scores, with mediation effects accounting for 3.16% and 2.58% of the total effect in the high SES and medium SES groups, respectively. The absence of significant interaction between PHQ-9 scores and either high (B = 0.099, p = 0.109) or medium SES (B = 0.003, p = 0.919) suggests that depressive symptoms do not moderate the association between SES and cognitive function.

Conclusion: Lower SES is associated with poorer cognitive performance, with depressive symptoms partially mediating the relationship between SES and cognition.

Background: Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a multifaceted neurodevelopmental disorder marked by impaired interactions and restricted interests, the pathophysiology of which is not fully understood. The current study explored the potential therapeutic effects of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) on the neurophysiological aspects of ASD, specifically focusing on the brain's excitatory/inhibitory (E/I) balance and behavioral outcomes, providing scientific guidance for ASD intervention.

Methods: Forty-two children with ASD were randomly divided into either an active tDCS or sham tDCS group. Electroencephalography (EEG) recordings were conducted before and after stimulation to assess E/I changesusing EEG markers including α oscillations and the aperiodic exponent, and average spatial phase synchronization (ASPS) analysis and detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA) were performed. Behavioral changes were evaluated using the Autism Behavior Checklist (ABC) and the Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS).

Results: Active tDCS resulted in significant increases in α oscillation power, reductions in α bandwidth, and improvements in γ-band ASPS and DFA values. Furthermore, participants in the active tDCS group exhibited improvements in behavioral scores on the ABC and SRS, with enhancements in social communication, sensory processing, and adaptive behavior. We found no significant changes in the sham group.

Conclusion: These findings suggest that tDCS intervention effectively reduced brain excitability and improved E/I balance and behavioral outcomes in children with ASD. The results warrant further investigation into the efficacy and underlying mechanisms of tDCS for ASD treatment.

Clinical trial registration: No: ChiCTR2400092790, https://www.chictr.org.cn/showproj.html?proj=249950.

Background: The Social Interaction Anxiety Scale-6 (SIAS-6) and Social Phobia Scale-6 (SPS-6) are self-reported measures of social anxiety. The aim of this study was to identify the best model for SIAS-6 and SPS-6 using the newly advanced method of exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM).

Methods: Both confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and ESEM were utilized to assess the factor structure of the SIAS-6 and SPS-6. Three hundred Korean adults (n _female = 150, aged: 39.28 ± 10.91 years) participated in an online survey and responded to the SIAS-6 and SPS-6 questionnaires.

Results: The findings showed that the bifactor ESEM and bifactor CFA models were a better fit than the other models. General factors had high loading values and reliability coefficients, whereas specific factors had moderate loading values and reliability coefficients. Additionally, measurement invariance across sexes was established.

Conclusion: This study demonstrated that bifactor models provide a unified perspective on the varying viewpoints regarding the relationship between social interaction and social performance anxiety.