[Emotion activation in personality disorders]

There are at least six psychotherapeutic treatments of personality disorders having received empirical and clinical validation in terms of their efficacy. These treatments are based on different theoretical models, namely the cognitive-behavioural, psychodynamic and interpersonal models. This article briefly presents these treatments, focusing on the process of therapeutic change. It is assumed that the process of emotional activation is one of the most interesting theoretical psychotherapy ingredient in treatments of these patients. The treatments are discussed regarding this hypothesis and its clinical implications.

The ventro-medial prefrontal cortex: a major link between the autonomic nervous system, regulation of emotion, and stress reactivity?

ABSTRACT: Recent progress in neuroscience revealed diverse regions of the CNS which moderate autonomic and affective responses. The ventro-medial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) plays a key role in these regulations. There is evidence that vmPFC activity is associated with cardiovascular changes during a motor task that are mediated by parasympathetic activity. Moreover, vmPFC activity makes important contributions to regulations of affective and stressful situations.This review selectively summarizes literature in which vmPFC activation was studied in healthy subjects as well as in patients with affective disorders. The reviewed literature suggests that vmPFC activity plays a pivotal role in biopsychosocial processes of disease. Activity in the vmPFC might link affective disorders, stressful environmental conditions, and immune function.

fMRI of Emotion

Recent brain imaging work has expanded our understanding of the mechanisms of perceptual, cognitive, and motor functions in human subjects, but research into the cerebral control of emotional and motivational function is at a much earlier stage. Important concepts and theories of emotion are briefly introduced, as are research designs and multimodal approaches to answering the central questions in the field. We provide a detailed inspection of the methodological and technical challenges in assessing the cerebral correlates of emotional activation, perception, learning, memory, and emotional regulation behavior in healthy humans. fMRI is particularly challenging in structures such as the amygdala as it is affected by susceptibility-related signal loss, image distortion, physiological and motion artifacts and colocalized Resting State Networks (RSNs). We review how these problems can be mitigated by using optimized echo-planar imaging (EPI) parameters, alternative MR sequences, and correction schemes. High-quality data can be acquired rapidly in these problematic regions with gradient compensated multiecho EPI or high resolution EPI with parallel imaging and optimum gradient directions, combined with distortion correction. Although neuroimaging studies of emotion encounter many difficulties regarding the limitations of measurement precision, research design, and strategies of validating neuropsychological emotion constructs, considerable improvement in data quality and sensitivity to subtle effects can be achieved. The methods outlined offer the prospect for fMRI studies of emotion to provide more sensitive, reliable, and representative models of measurement that systematically relate the dynamics of emotional regulation behavior with topographically distinct patterns of activity in the brain. This will provide additional information as an aid to assessment, categorization, and treatment of patients with emotional and personality disorders.

Prospective effects of emotion regulation on emotional adjustment

Deficits in emotion-regulation skills have widely been shown to be associated with poor emotional adjustment. However, it is still unclear whether these deficits are a cause or a consequence of poor adjustment. The purpose of the present research was to clarify the reciprocal effects between these 2 concepts. In 2 studies (Ns = 446 and 635), self-reports of emotion regulation and emotional adjustment were assessed twice with a 2-week interval. Cross-lagged regression analyses demonstrated that self-reports of emotion regulation predicted subsequent adjustment, over and above the effects of previous adjustment, whereas emotional adjustment did not predict subsequent emotion regulation. Thus, a focus on emotion-regulation skills may be important in the prevention and treatment of affect-related mental health problems.