Convergence and divergence of neuroanatomic correlates and executive task performance in healthy controls and psychiatric participants

• Published in: Psychiatry research. Neuroimaging Vol. 214; no. 3; pp. 221 - 228
• Main Authors: Ming-Tak Chung, Dennis, Jerram, Matthew W., Lee, Jonathan K., Katz, Harvey, Gansler, David A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Shannon Elsevier Ireland Ltd 30.12.2013; Elsevier
• Subjects: Adult; Attention - physiology; Biological and medical sciences; Brain Mapping; Case-Control Studies; Cognitive control; Color; Executive Function - physiology; Female; Frontal lobe; Frontal Lobe - pathology; Frontal Lobe - physiology; Frontal Lobe - physiopathology; Humans; Language; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Male; Medical sciences; Mental Disorders - pathology; Mental Disorders - physiopathology; Neuropsychological Tests; Neuropsychology; Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychomotor Performance - physiology; Psychopathology; Psychopathology. Psychiatry; Radiology; Set shirting; Structural brain image analysis; Wisconsin; Wisconsin; Frontal lobe; Structural brain image analysis; Set shirting; Psychopathology; Neuropsychology; Cognitive control; Human; Executive function; Healthy subject; Central nervous system; Cognition; Encephalon; Image analysis; Neuropsychologia
• ISSN: 0925-4927; 1872-7506
• DOI: 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2013.08.006

The associations between brain matter volume in the cerebral cortex and set shifting and attentional control as operationalized by the Wisconsin Card Sort Test (WCST) and Condition Three of the Delis–Kaplan version of the Color Word Interference Test (CWIT) were investigated in 15 healthy controls and 16 heterogeneously diagnosed psychiatric patients with self-control problems using voxel based morphometry. Both groups underwent standardized magnetic resonance imaging and neuropsychological assessment. WCST and CWIT variables, and a composite, were regressed across the whole brain. Although CWIT performance levels were the same in both groups, neuroanatomic correlates for the psychiatric participants invoked the left hemisphere language system, but the bilateral dorsal attention system in the healthy controls. On its own, no neuroanatomic correlates were observed for the WCST. But when part of a composite with CWIT, neuroanatomic correlates in the dorsal attention system emerged for the psychiatric participants. Psychometric combinations of manifest executive task variables may best represent higher level latent neuro-cognitive control systems. Factor analytic studies of neuropsychological test performances suggest the constructs being measured are the same across psychiatric and non-diagnosed participants, however, imaging modalities indicate the relevant neural architecture can vary by group.