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Neural correlates of personality dimensions and affective measures during the anticipation of emotional stimuli

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Abstract

Neuroticism and extraversion are proposed personality dimensions for individual emotion processing. Neuroticism is correlated with depression and anxiety disorders, implicating a common neurobiological basis. Extraversion is rather inversely correlated with anxiety and depression. We examined neural correlates of personality in relation to depressiveness and anxiety in healthy adult subjects with functional magnetic resonance imaging during the cued anticipation of emotional stimuli. Distributed particularly prefrontal but also other cortical regions and the thalamus were associated with extraversion. Parieto-occipital and temporal regions and subcortically the caudate were correlated with neuroticism and affective measures. Neuroticism-related regions were partially cross-correlated with anxiety and depression and vice versa. Extraversion-related activity was not correlated with the other measures. The neural correlates of extraversion compared with those of neuroticism and affective measures fit with concepts of different neurobiological bases of the personality dimensions and point at predispositions for affective disorders.

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful to Dr. C. Huber and C. Sauerwald, Hirslanden Clinic, for providing the fMRI-scanning. This work was supported by a grant of the Swiss National Funds granted to U.H.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Clinic for Social and General Psychiatry, Psychiatric University Hospital Zürich, Militärstrasse 8, 8021, Zürich, Switzerland

    Annette Beatrix Brühl, Marie-Caroline Viebke & Uwe Herwig

  2. Department of Psychology, University of Basel, Missionsstrasse 62 a, 4055, Basel, Switzerland

    Thomas Baumgartner

  3. Department of Neurology, University Hospital Zürich, Frauenklinikstrasse 26, 8091, Zürich, Switzerland

    Tina Kaffenberger

  4. Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy III, University of Ulm, Leimgrubenweg 12-14, 89075, Ulm, Germany

    Uwe Herwig

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  1. Annette Beatrix Brühl
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  2. Marie-Caroline Viebke
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  3. Thomas Baumgartner
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  4. Tina Kaffenberger
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Correspondence to Annette Beatrix Brühl.

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Supplementary Table S1

Correlation of the brain activation (beta-weights) of the primary regions of interest with the respective other psychometric measures. (DOC 97 kb)

Supplementary Figure S1

Overview of the regions correlating with measures of personality and affectivity, here shown during the anticipation of negative stimuli. (DOC 267 kb)

Supplementary Figure S2

Overview of the regions correlating with measures of personality and affectivity during the anticipation of positive stimuli (DOC 265 kb)

Supplementary Figure S3

Overview of the regions correlating with measures of personality and affectivity during the anticipation of unknown/ambiguously cued stimuli (DOC 268 kb)

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Brühl, A.B., Viebke, MC., Baumgartner, T. et al. Neural correlates of personality dimensions and affective measures during the anticipation of emotional stimuli. Brain Imaging and Behavior 5, 86–96 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11682-011-9114-7

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