A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study of light therapy for antepartum depression.

Objective: Affective disorder during pregnancy is a common condition requiring careful judgment to treat the depression while minimizing risk to the fetus. Following up on promising pilot trials, we studied the efficacy of light therapy.

Method: Twenty-seven pregnant women with nonseasonal major depressive disorder according to DSM-IV (outpatients, university polyclinic) were randomly assigned to 7,000 lux fluorescent bright white or 70 lux dim red (placebo) light administered at home in the morning upon awakening for 1 h/d in a 5-week double-blind trial carried out between October 2004 and October 2008.

Neural substrates of reward magnitude, probability, and risk during a wheel of fortune decision-making task.

Economic decision-making involves the weighting of magnitude and probability of potential gains/losses. While previous work has examined the neural systems involved in decision-making, there is a need to understand how the parameters associated with decision-making (e.g.

Intra-dimensional/extra-dimensional set-shifting performance in schizophrenia: impact of distractors.

Background: We sought to determine if a representative group of young chronic patients with schizophrenia would demonstrate selective impairments in set shifting processes of the CANTAB Intra-dimensional/extra-dimensional (IDED) task. We predicted that patients would have prominent difficulties with Compound Discrimination (C_D) (stage of the task in which irrelevant stimuli are introduced) and Extra-Dimensional Shifting (EDS) (stage of the task in which a new stimulus dimension must be attended) on the basis of the results of cortical hypodopaminergic states in subhuman primates (for C_D) and effects of dorsolateral prefrontal cortical lesions on set shifting and prior results in schizophrenia (for EDS).

Methods: We administered the IDED to 36 patients and 26 healthy controls.

Behavioral alterations in reward system function: the role of childhood maltreatment and psychopathology.

Objective: To examine in children the influence of maltreatment and associated psychiatric sequelae on behavioral responses to reward stimuli.

Method: A computerized two-choice decision-making task involving probabilistic monetary gains was used to probe elemental processes of goal-directed actions. Using different risk contingencies, the authors examined decision-making, expectations of outcomes, and affective responses to rewards in 38 maltreated children and 21 demographically matched controls (8-14 years old).

Age-related influence of contingencies on a saccade task.

Adolescence is characterized by increased risk-taking and sensation-seeking, presumably brought about by developmental changes within reward-mediating brain circuits. A better understanding of the neural mechanisms underlying reward-seeking during adolescence can have critical implications for the development of strategies to enhance adolescent performance in potentially dangerous situations. Yet little research has investigated the influence of age on the modulation of behavior by incentives with neuroscience-based methods.

Cognitive control under contingencies in anxious and depressed adolescents: an antisaccade task.

Background: Emotion-related perturbations in cognitive control characterize adult mood and anxiety disorders. Fewer data are available to confirm such deficits in youth. Studies of cognitive control and error processing can provide an ideal template to examine these perturbations.

Amygdala and nucleus accumbens in responses to receipt and omission of gains in adults and adolescents.

Adolescents' propensity for risk-taking and reward-seeking behaviors suggests a heightened sensitivity for reward, reflected by greater feedback-related activity changes in reward circuitry (e.g., nucleus accumbens), and/or a lower sensitivity to potential harm reflected by weaker feedback-related activity changes in avoidance circuitry (e.

Reward-related processes in pediatric bipolar disorder: a pilot study.

Background: Neuropsychological research on children with bipolar disorder (BPD) is scarce. Here, we examine reward-related behaviors in children with BPD using a Wheel of Fortune task in which subjects could win or lose money depending on their decisions. The intent of this work was to investigate performance differences between BPD and healthy children on a task that could be used in an fMRI environment to inform the neural substrates of reward processes in BPD.

Neuroimaging and mechanisms of drug abuse: interface of molecular imaging and molecular genetics.

Whereas ligand studies can inform the end-products of dysregulation of genetic expression, reporter gene imaging can provide the means to understand the genetic origin of these end-products. As with radioligand studies, in vivo direct measurement of gene expression will allow genetic processes to be monitored over time in the same subject, use of a subject as his/her own control in intervention studies (i.e.