Endocannabinoid system reactivity during stress processing in healthy humans.

Stress underlies the development of various psychiatric disorders. Rodent studies suggest an involvement of the endocannabinoid system in the modulation of the stress response, which needs to be translated to humans. In this study, 22 healthy males (mean age: M = 22.

FAAH polymorphism (rs324420) modulates extinction recall in healthy humans: an fMRI study.

Gold standard treatments for anxiety- and trauma-related disorders focus on exposure therapy promoting extinction learning and extinction retention. However, its efficacy is limited. Preclinical and particularly animal research has been able to demonstrate that homozygosity for the fatty acid amide hydrolase (FAAH) C385A allele, similar to FAAH inhibition, is associated with elevated concentrations of anandamide (AEA) and facilitates extinction learning and extinction recall.

Correction: Depression, mitochondrial bioenergetics, and electroconvulsive therapy: a new approach towards personalized medicine in psychiatric treatment - a short review and current perspective.

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.

Depression, mitochondrial bioenergetics, and electroconvulsive therapy: a new approach towards personalized medicine in psychiatric treatment - a short review and current perspective.

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is a globally occurring phenomenon and developed into a severe socio-economic challenge. Despite decades of research, the underlying pathophysiological processes of MDD remain incompletely resolved. Like other mental disorders, MDD is hypothesized to mainly affect the central nervous system (CNS).

Neural correlates of mindful self-awareness in mindfulness meditators and meditation-naïve subjects revisited.

Mindful self-awareness is central to mindfulness meditation and plays a key role in its salutary effects. It has been related to decreased activation in cortical midline structures (CMS) and amygdala, and increased activation in somatosensory regions. However, findings in untrained individuals are contradictory, and scarce in experienced meditators.

Altered processing of self-related emotional stimuli in mindfulness meditators.

Mental health benefits of mindfulness techniques are thought to involve changes in self-processing, such as decreased attachment to the self, higher self-compassion and lower emotional reactivity to inner experience. However, self-related emotion processing in regular mindfulness practitioners is not extensively studied. In the current work we investigate differential neural and behavioral correlates of self-criticism and self-praise in 22 mid-to-long-term mindfulness meditators (LTM) compared to 22 matched meditation-naïve participants (MNP).

Neural circuits associated with positive and negative self-appraisal.

Self-worth is particularly influenced by self-appraisal, which is negatively biased in many psychiatric disorders. Positive and negative self-appraisals also shape current emotional states or even evoke defensive reactions, when they are incongruent with a subject's current state. Prior studies have mainly used externally given evaluative appraisals.