Childhood abuse and EEG source localization in crack cocaine dependence

• Published in: Psychiatry research. Neuroimaging Vol. 213; no. 1; pp. 63 - 70
• Main Authors: Alper, Kenneth, Shah, Jaini, Howard, Bryant, Roy John, E., Prichep, Leslie S.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Shannon Elsevier Ireland Ltd 30.07.2013; Elsevier
• Subjects: Addictive behaviors; Adult; Adult and adolescent clinical studies; Adult Survivors of Child Abuse - psychology; Biological and medical sciences; Brain Waves - drug effects; Brain Waves - physiology; Case-Control Studies; Cerebral Cortex - drug effects; Cerebral Cortex - physiopathology; Child; Childhood sexual or physical abuse; Cocaine-Related Disorders - physiopathology; Crack Cocaine - pharmacology; Drug addiction; Electroencephalography; Female; Humans; Male; Medical sciences; Parahippocampal Gyrus; Perirhinal cortex; Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychopathology. Psychiatry; Quantitative EEG (QEEG); Radiology; sLORETA; Theta Rhythm; Victimology; Quantitative EEG (QEEG); sLORETA; Childhood sexual or physical abuse; Perirhinal cortex; Parahippocampal gyrus; Human; Drug addiction; Violence; Central nervous system; ParahIppocampal cortex; Electrophysiology; Electroencephalography; Victimology; Encephalon; Electrodiagnosis; Ester; Child abuse; Source localization; Dependence; Sexual abuse; Cocaine; Drug of abuse
• ISSN: 0925-4927; 1872-7506
• DOI: 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2013.01.008

Fourteen subjects with histories of sexual and/or physical abuse in childhood and 13 matched control subjects were selected from a consecutive series of clients in residential treatment for crack cocaine dependence. Standardized low-resolution electromagnetic brain tomography (sLORETA) was used to estimate the source generators of the EEG in a cortical mask with voxel z-scores referenced to normative data at frequency intervals of 039Hz, with nonparametric permutation to correct by randomization for the number of comparisons and the intercorrelations and variance of distribution of voxel values. Subjects with histories of abuse in childhood had significantly greater EEG power than controls in the theta frequency range (3.51–7.41Hz), with greatest differences in the 3.90-Hz band distributed mainly in the parahippocampal, fusiform, lingual, posterior cingulate, and insular gyri. The groups did not differ significantly with regard to delta (1.56–3.12Hz), alpha (7.81–12.48Hz), beta (12.87–19.89Hz), and gamma (20.28–35.10Hz) frequency power. In excess, theta EEG power, a bandwidth of transactions among hippocampus and amygdala and paralimbic and visual association cortex, may be a correlate of childhood exposure to abuse.