Reactivity of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, but not the amygdala, to negative emotion faces predicts greed personality trait

• Published in: Behavioral and brain functions Vol. 19; no. 1; pp. 1 - 21
• Main Authors: Deng, Kun, Jin, Weipeng, Jiang, Keying, Li, Zixi, Im, Hohjin, Chen, Shuning, Du, Hanxiao, Guan, Shunping, Ge, Wei, Wei, Chuqiao, Zhang, Bin, Wang, Pinchun, Zhao, Guang, Chen, Chunhui, Liu, Liqing, Wang, Qiang
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London BioMed Central 01.12.2023; BMC
• Subjects: Amygdala; Anxiety; Autism; Brain mapping; Brain research; Emotional regulation; Emotions; Face; Females; Functional connectivity; Functional magnetic resonance imaging; Greed; Information processing; Investigations; Magnetic resonance imaging; Mental depression; Mental disorders; Neural networks; Neuroimaging; Personality; Personality traits; Post traumatic stress disorder; PPI; Prefrontal cortex; Questionnaires; Seeds; Visual pathways; vmPFC
• ISSN: 1744-9081; 1744-9081
• DOI: 10.1186/s12993-023-00223-w

This study explored whether amygdala reactivity predicted the greed personality trait (GPT) using both task-based and resting-state functional connectivity analyses (ntotal = 452). In Cohort 1 (n = 83), task-based functional magnetic resonance imaging (t-fMRI) results from a region-of-interest (ROI) analysis revealed no direct correlation between amygdala reactivity to fearful and angry faces and GPT. Instead, whole-brain analyses revealed GPT to robustly negatively vary with activations in the right ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), supramarginal gyrus, and angular gyrus in the contrast of fearful + angry faces > shapes. Moreover, task-based psychophysiological interaction (PPI) analyses showed that the high GPT group showed weaker functional connectivity of the vmPFC seed with a top-down control network and visual pathways when processing fearful or angry faces compared to their lower GPT counterparts. In Cohort 2, resting-state functional connectivity (rs-FC) analyses indicated stronger connectivity between the vmPFC seed and the top-down control network and visual pathways in individuals with higher GPT. Comparing the two cohorts, bilateral amygdala seeds showed weaker associations with the top-down control network in the high group via PPI analyses in Cohort 1. Yet, they exhibited distinct rs-FC patterns in Cohort 2 (e.g., positive associations of GPT with the left amygdala-top-down network FC but negative associations with the right amygdala-visual pathway FC). The study underscores the role of the vmPFC and its functional connectivity in understanding GPT, rather than amygdala reactivity.