New aspects of cognition domains and psychopathological measures in psychiatry

Excerpt

Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) including its subtypes (diarrhea, constipation, mixed states) has regularly been associated with anxiety and depressive symptom levels. Fond et al. [1] can now confirm this assumption via a systematic review and meta-analysis after screening published studies and accessible theses within five well-established databases. Despite partly questionable study quality, the review of altogether 885 patients and 1,384 healthy controls in ten studies yielded significant evidence for higher anxiety and depression levels in patients compared with controls with inconsistencies for the IBS subtypes, which require deeper attentiveness. In their well-designed study, Yen et al. [2] addressed the difficulties in cognitive control and working memory in 63 Chinese women suffering from premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) versus 74 controls via exploring effects of gonadotropic hormone and polymorphism of serotonin 1A receptor (HTR1A; rs6295—please pay attention to the authors’ erratum [10] concerning false spellings in Tables 1, 2, and 4 plus Figure 1D–F) on cognitive deficit. Assessing working memory via the Go/Nogo, 2-back, and 3-back tasks for three menstrual cycles, the hypothesized cognitive decline in women with PMDD could be confirmed. The authors furthermore found an association of the G/G genotype of HTR1A (rs6295) with poor working memory in the premenstrual phase which points to a reduced serotonin neurotransmission in PMDD. The Go/Nogo task was also used by Ko et al. [3] in their fMRI study of Internet gaming disorder (IGD) focusing on impulsivity and brain correlates of response inhibition and error processing in 26 affected subjects compared with 23 controls. The authors found not only the expected higher impulsivity in IGD patients but also higher brain activation on response inhibition, especially over the left frontal lobe and bilateral caudate nucleus, while the activation over the right insula was lower compared with controls. These findings support the assumption of the frontostriatal plus salience network contributing to error processing. …