Oxytocin enhances basolateral amygdala activation and functional connectivity while processing emotional faces: preliminary findings in autistic vs non-autistic women.

Oxytocin is hypothesized to promote social interactions by enhancing the salience of social stimuli. While previous neuroimaging studies have reported that oxytocin enhances amygdala activation to face stimuli in autistic men, effects in autistic women remain unclear. In this study, the influence of intranasal oxytocin on activation and functional connectivity of the basolateral amygdala-the brain's 'salience detector'-while processing emotional faces vs shapes was tested in 16 autistic and 21 non-autistic women by functional magnetic resonance imaging in a placebo-controlled, within-subject, cross-over design.