Can brain scans tell us how successful CBT for anxiety will be? Meta-analysis of task-based fMRI studies shows promise

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Millie Lowther, Isabel Luetkenherm, Carlos Mena and Alexandra Pike summarise a recent fMRI meta-analysis, which finds that activation in brain circuits related to salience, interoception and emotional processing were found to predict a positive response to CBT in anxiety disorders.

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Can brain scans help reduce the guilt and shame associated with adolescent self-harm?

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Rachel Symons summarises a recent study, which shows that poor connectivity between brain regions may be an indicator of non-suicidal self-injury in young people.

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Emotional symptoms in adolescent girls: what can we learn from the functional connectivity of neural pathways?

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Shubhangi Karmaker on a recent resting-state fMRI study that explores neural network disturbances that underpin the emergence of emotional symptoms in adolescent girls.

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Resilience to depression: neural markers in adolescent at-risk females

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Matthew Broome appraises a recent cohort study that looks at neural markers of resilience in young women at familial risk for major depressive disorder.

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MRI in first episode psychosis

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Dan Joyce publishes his debut blog on a recent paper in the British Journal of Psychiatry that considers the feasibility and clinical utility of magnetic resonance imaging in first-episode psychosis.

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Can fMRI measuring striatal connectivity help predict response to antipsychotics?

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Samei Huda steps into George Clooney’s shoes to discuss baseline striatal functional connectivity as a predictor of response to antipsychotic drug treatment.

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Are humans like monkeys? MRI scanning suggests similarities and differences that might help future research

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Does a mouse think like a human? Does a cat? Does a macaque monkey? These are fascinating questions to ask on a philosophical level, but they are also of immense practical importance. Current regulations on drug development mean that animal research plays a huge role in deciding what substances might be safe and beneficial to humans.  [read the full story…]

Trying to understand brain networks associated with depression is hampered by how variable the condition is

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At the start of using neuroimaging to try and understand mental health problems, the focus was on a specific area of the brain that might be different.  As the methods have become more sophisticated, the ability to look at how different areas of the brain are linked into functional networks has developed.  Whilst damage to [read the full story…]

Can MRI scanning help diagnose autism in infants?

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After recent posts delving off into dark woodlands of some methodologically challenging brain imaging studies, we are coming back to a more simple idea: repeatedly scanning the same people from before they develop a disorder through to receiving a diagnosis.  What is different about this study is that it was done with infants aged 6-36 [read the full story…]

Brain imaging suggests that differences in emotional processing are present before developing depression

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When trying to understand more about about mental health problems one of the big questions is: are the results of a study due to how the person is currently feeling or are the results due to a predisposition to how they are feeling now? While often the answer will be a bit of both, researchers [read the full story…]