Prefrontal-Limbic Brain Circuitry and the Regulation of Emotion

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Annmarie MacNamara ◽  
K. Luan Phan
Keyword(s):  
Emotion Dysregulation ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Neural Basis ◽  
Proposed Model ◽  
Brain Circuitry ◽  
Post Traumatic ◽  
Regulation Of Emotion ◽  
Mental Well Being ◽  
The Brain

The ability to regulate emotion promotes mental well-being in health and is disrupted in psychopathologies such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The prefrontal cortex (PFC)—a region of the brain involved in executive function, behavioral coordination, and cognitive control—is particularly important in implementing the regulation of emotional response. This chapter reviews a decade and a half of neuroscientific research that has made considerable progress in advancing understanding of the neural basis of emotion regulation. This work, conducted in healthy individuals, provides a platform from which to understand the neural basis of emotion dysregulation that characterizes disorders like PTSD. Therefore, the proposed model could serve as a basis for explaining the etiology and/or maintenance of PTSD. The chapter concludes by summarizing the main findings and highlighting areas that need more work, including translation into the clinical domain.

scholarly journals Assessing Anxiety Disorders Using Wearable Devices: Challenges and Future Directions

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohamed Elgendi ◽  
Carlo Menon
Keyword(s):  
Anxiety Disorders ◽  
Experimental Studies ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Wearable Devices ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Obsessive Compulsive ◽  
Future Directions ◽  
Post Traumatic ◽  
Electrocardiogram Ecg ◽  
Mental Well Being

Wearable devices (WD) are starting to increasingly be used for interventions to promote well-being by reducing anxiety disorders (AD). Electrocardiogram (ECG) signal is one of the most commonly used biosignals for assessing the cardiovascular system as it significantly reflects the activity of the autonomic nervous system during emotional changes. Little is known about the accuracy of using ECG features for detecting ADs. Moreover, during our literature review, a limited number of studies were found that involve ECG collection using WD for promoting mental well-being. Thus, for the sake of validating the reliability of ECG features for detecting anxiety in WD, we screened 1040 articles, and only 22 were considered for our study; specifically 6 on panic, 4 on post-traumatic stress, 4 on generalized anxiety, 3 on social, 3 on mixed, and 2 on obsessive-compulsive anxiety disorder articles. Most experimental studies had controversial results. Upon reviewing each of these papers, it became apparent that the use of ECG features for detecting different types of anxiety is controversial, and the use of ECG-WD is an emerging area of research, with limited evidence suggesting its reliability. Due to the clinical nature of most studies, it is difficult to determine the specific impact of ECG features on detecting ADs, suggesting the need for more robust studies following our proposed recommendations.

MENTAL WELL-BEING IN SETTINGS OF ‘COMPLEX EMERGENCY’: AN OVERVIEW

2004 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 381-388 ◽  
Author(s):  
ASTIER M. ALMEDOM ◽  
DEREK SUMMERFIELD
Keyword(s):  
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder ◽  
Traumatic Stress ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Humanitarian Assistance ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Scholarly Journals ◽  
Academic Researchers ◽  
Complex Emergency ◽  
Post Traumatic ◽  
Mental Well Being

The mental state of people affected by war and other disasters has been a subject of special interest to academic researchers and practitioners in humanitarian assistance and public health for over two decades. The last decade in particular has seen a rise in the number of papers published in scholarly journals around the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) debate. Anthropologists have rarely engaged in this debate. Nevertheless, some of the most illuminating contributions have come from socio-medical anthropology (Last, 2000).

scholarly journals COVID-19 and students' mental health: foreign studies

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-91
Author(s):  
T.V. Ermolova ◽  
A.V. Litvinov ◽  
N.V. Savitskaya ◽  
O.A. Krukovskaya
Keyword(s):  
Mental Disorders ◽  
Cumulative Effect ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Learning Capacity ◽  
The Face ◽  
Analytical Review ◽  
Post Traumatic ◽  
Remote Care ◽  
Mental Well Being

This analytical review provides a broad outline of the historically significant process of consolidating the global scientific community in the face of the threat posed to the psyche of children and young people by the COVID-19 pandemic. The formation of vector data arrays, revealing aspects and prevalence of mental disorders of children, provoked by a pandemic, is shown. In the majority of students, the additional neuro-psychological load led to increased anxiety, depressive states, post-traumatic stress, decreased learning capacity. There are studies of the psyche of students in families in connection with the phenomenon of screen-time (time spent at the computer screen), the presence of comorbid disorders, narrowing of communication, closing schools. The importance of adequate parenthood for children's mental well-being, educational strategy for parents, volunteers, nurses is shown. The direction of telepsychiatry as a remote care tool has been demonstrated. Pilots of the concept of mental disorders of students against the background of the pandemic are presented. The questions about the delayed cumulative effect of mental disorders in students and the continuing incompleteness of knowledge about it are also raised.

Body Armor for the Mind

2021 ◽  
pp. 27-40
Author(s):  
Michael Donald Sullivan
Keyword(s):  
First Responders ◽  
Medical Personnel ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Body Armor ◽  
Health Issues ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Management Personnel ◽  
Post Traumatic ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Mental Well Being

This chapter looks at the often overlooked yet vitally important steps of mental preparation for first responders, emergency and disaster management personnel, and command center staffs. This chapter will delve into the importance of using simulations and exercises to focus on the mental well-being of our responders to prevent future incidents of post-traumatic stress disorder and other health issues. The past 19 years of war against terrorism starting with the attacks on 9/11 coupled with the recent outbreak of COVID-19 has brought to the forefront the necessity to mentally prepare our warriors, our first responders, and our medical personnel to operate effectively in the toxic environment of a disaster or emergency. This chapter aims to help build that awareness and facilitate planning.

Vivid Memory of �When� a Happy Event Happened is Associated with Mental Well-being: A Natural Language Processing Based Study (Preprint)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kaoru Ito ◽  
Daisaku Shibata ◽  
Shoko Wakamiya ◽  
Eiji Aramaki
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Psychological Disorder ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Exact Test ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Post Traumatic ◽  
Time Specific ◽  
Vivid Memories ◽  
Mental Well Being

BACKGROUND Overgenerality or specificity of autobiographical memory is associated with psychological disorders such as major depressive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, and drug addiction. Current methods to measure overgenerality rely upon researchers’ subjective judgment, although automatic tools can measure other language-based scores for psychological disorder screening. OBJECTIVE This study was conducted to detect time-specific expressions, an aspect of specificity, in an episode. METHODS We analyzed 7000 episodes reported by 1000 participants via crowdsourcing, using Japanese language parsers to extract time-related expressions. Each participant wrote seven episodes according to seven emotional stimulus words. Three participant groups were made according to their WHO-5 well-being index score. The high well-being score (WB) group and low-WB group were examined to assess time expression usage (high-WB group; WB ≥ 60, n = 367, mean WB = 70.6, std = 10.5: low-WB group; WB ≤ 40, n = 378, mean WB = 27.5, std = 11.4). RESULTS Two-sided Fisher’s exact test revealed that happy episodes with detailed time expressions are significantly more numerous in the high-WB group than in the low-WB group (P = .001), but no significant difference was found for any other pair. CONCLUSIONS Results show that vivid memories about a happy event are associated with mental well-being.

Putative Blood Somatic Mutations in Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder-Symptomatic Soldiers: High Impact of Cytoskeletal and Inflammatory Proteins

2021 ◽  
Vol 79 (4) ◽  
pp. 1723-1734
Author(s):  
Shlomo Sragovich ◽  
Michael Gershovits ◽  
Jacqueline C.K. Lam ◽  
Victor O.K. Li ◽  
Illana Gozes
Keyword(s):  
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder ◽  
Traumatic Stress ◽  
Somatic Mutations ◽  
Stress Disorder ◽  
Ptsd Symptom ◽  
High Impact ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Blood Samples ◽  
Post Traumatic ◽  
The Brain

Background: We recently discovered autism/intellectual disability somatic mutations in postmortem brains, presenting higher frequency in Alzheimer’s disease subjects, compared with the controls. We further revealed high impact cytoskeletal gene mutations, coupled with potential cytoskeleton-targeted repair mechanisms. Objective: The current study was aimed at further discerning if somatic mutations in brain diseases are presented only in the most affected tissue (the brain), or if blood samples phenocopy the brain, toward potential diagnostics. Methods: Variant calling analyses on an RNA-seq database including peripheral blood samples from 85 soldiers (58 controls and 27 with symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, PTSD) was performed. Results: High (e.g., protein truncating) as well as moderate impact (e.g., single amino acid change) germline and putative somatic mutations in thousands of genes were found. Further crossing the mutated genes with autism, intellectual disability, cytoskeleton, inflammation, and DNA repair databases, identified the highest number of cytoskeletal-mutated genes (187 high and 442 moderate impact). Most of the mutated genes were shared and only when crossed with the inflammation database, more putative high impact mutated genes specific to the PTSD-symptom cohorts versus the controls (14 versus 13) were revealed, highlighting tumor necrosis factor specifically in the PTSD-symptom cohorts. Conclusion: With microtubules and neuro-immune interactions playing essential roles in brain neuroprotection and Alzheimer-related neurodegeneration, the current mutation discoveries contribute to mechanistic understanding of PTSD and brain protection, as well as provide future diagnostics toward personalized military deployment strategies and drug design.

scholarly journals Healthcare staff well-being and use of support services during COVID-19: a UK perspective

2021 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. e100458
Author(s):  
Anika R Petrella ◽  
Luke Hughes ◽  
Lorna A Fern ◽  
Lisa Monaghan ◽  
Benjamin Hannon ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Psychological Distress ◽  
Acute Phase ◽  
Traumatic Stress ◽  
Service Use ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Rapid Evaluation ◽  
Personal Factors ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Supportive Services ◽  
Post Traumatic

BackgroundThe COVID-19 pandemic has drastically increased demands on healthcare workers (HCWs) leaving them vulnerable to acute psychological distress, burnout and post-traumatic stress. In response, supportive services in a central London hospital mobilised mental health support specifically for HCWs.AimsThis rapid evaluation assessed HCW psychological welfare during the acute phase of the COVID-19 pandemic and their use of supportive services made available.MethodsDuring the acute phase of COVID-19 (April to May 2020) all staff working for the hospital were invited to complete an online survey assessing well-being (self-rated health, moral distress exposure, symptoms of burnout and psychological distress) and use of available supportive services (awareness of, use and perceived helpfulness). Associations among personal characteristics and psychological well-being were explored using correlations and linear regression.ResultsA total of 1127 staff participated in the rapid evaluation. On average, psychological distress was high (mean (SD): 22 (7.57)) regardless of role, with 84% of this sample scoring above the general population mean (14.5). Nearly half of the sample reported feeling emotionally drained and a profile emerged displaying higher levels of psychological distress and burnout in those who were younger and exposed to morally distressing situations, with this group also exhibiting greater support service use. Greater levels of burnout were associated with increased psychological distress when controlling for personal factors. During this acute phase of the pandemic, majority of staff used at least one service and rated it as helpful.ConclusionHCWs experienced high levels of psychological distress requiring continued support as the COVID-19 pandemic evolved. Although HCWs were aware of supportive services, uptake varied. In order to mitigate the risk of burnout and post-traumatic stress, long-term, effective strategies that facilitate staff accessing support are urgently required.

scholarly journals Post-traumatic stress disorder following COVID-19 pandemic among medical students in Riyadh: a cross-sectional study

2021 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zainab Ifthikar ◽  
Saima Sajjad Fakih ◽  
Saumy Johnson ◽  
Johnson Alex
Keyword(s):  
Medical Students ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder ◽  
Traumatic Stress ◽  
Stress Disorder ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Emotional Impact ◽  
Post Traumatic Stress ◽  
Psychological Well Being ◽  
Post Traumatic ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Background In recent times, COVID-19 has been recognized as a public health emergency and thus far, most papers published on it are focused only on the clinical characteristics of infected patients. This pandemic has also made phenomenal emotional impact among the young and the old. We aimed to find out the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the psychological well-being of medical students in a University at Riyadh. Results There were 309 participants in the study. Out of them 44% did not have PTSD, 29% had score more than 37 which might contribute to immune suppression, in 18.4% PTSD was a clinical concern and 8.6% had probable PTSD. Female participants were the majority in the group and they also had higher chance of having consequences than the male counterparts (P < 0.001). Avoidance score between male and female gender was significantly different. Conclusion COVID-19 pandemic has not just affected the physiological functioning of the affected individuals but also has had a probable post-traumatic stress disorder among young college students. Screening for psychological well-being and the treatment for PTSD is imperative in college, school and general population.

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