There has been a long controversy concerning whether the amygdala's response to emotional stimuli is automatic or dependent on attentional load. Using magnoencephalography and an advanced beamformer source localization technique, we found that amygdala automaticity was a function of time: while early amygdala responding to emotional stimuli (40 -140 ms) was unaffected by attentional load, later amygdala response (280 -410 ms), subsequent to frontoparietal cortex activity, was modulated by attentional load.

Youths with conduct disorder or oppositional defiant disorder and psychopathic traits (CD/ODD+PT) are at high risk of adult anti-social behaviour and psychopathy. Neuroimaging studies demonstrate functional abnormalities in orbitofrontal cortex and the amygdala in both youths and adults with psychopathic traits. Diffusion tensor imaging in psychopathic adults demonstrates disrupted structural connectivity between these regions (uncinate fasiculus). The current study examined whether functional neural abnormalities present in youths with CD/ODD+PT are associated with similar white matter abnormalities. Youths with CD/ODD+PT and comparison participants completed 3.0 T diffusion tensor scans and functional MRI scans. Diffusion tensor imaging did not reveal disruption in structural connections within the uncinate fasiculus or other white matter tracts in youths with CD/ODD+PT, despite the demonstration of disrupted amygdala-prefrontal functional connectivity in these youths. These results suggest that disrupted amygdala-frontal white matter connectivity as measured by fractional anisotropy is less sensitive than imaging measurements of functional perturbations in youths with psychopathic traits. If white matter tracts are intact in youths with this disorder, childhood may provide a critical window for intervention and treatment, before significant structural brain abnormalities solidify.

Objective Generalized social phobia (GSP) is defined by a persistent fear of social disapproval. However, the neural underpinnings of this increased fear and its mediating factors are unclear. Using event-related fMRI, we examined whether the intent of an event, which mediates the neural response to social disapproval in healthy individuals, differentially affects response in GSP. Specifically, would patients with GSP show particularly increased response to embarrassing, unintentional transgressions? Method Sixteen patients with GSP and sixteen age, IQ, and gender matched healthy individuals read stories during fMRI scans that either involved neutral social events, unintentional social transgressions (e.g., choking on food at party, and coughing it up), or intentional social transgressions (e.g., disliking food at party, and spitting it out). Results Significant group-by-transgression interactions were observed within ventral regions of medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). Healthy individuals tended to show increased BOLD responses to intentional, relative to unintentional transgressions. The patients with GSP, however, showed significantly increased responses to the unintentional transgressions. In addition, they rated the unintentional transgressions as significantly more embarrassing than the comparison individuals. We also observed significant group main effects within the amygdala and bilateral insula, reflecting elevated GSP responses within these regions to all event types. Conclusions These results further implicate the MPFC in the pathophysiology of GSP, specifically through its involvement in distorted self-referential processing. In addition, the current results further underscore the extended role of the amygdala and insula in the processing of social stimuli more generally in GSP.

Generalized social phobia (GSP) involves the fear of being negatively evaluated. Previous work suggests that self-referentiality, mediated by medial prefrontal cortex (MFPC), plays an important role in the disorder. However, it is not clear whether this anomalous MPFC response to selfrelated information in patients with GSP concerns an increased representation of their own or others' opinions. In this paper we examined whether GSP is associated with increased response to own (1 st person) or other individuals' (2 nd person) opinions relative to healthy individuals. Unmedicated individuals with GSP (n=15) and age, IQ, and gender-matched comparison individuals (n=15) read 1 st (e.g., I'm ugly), and 2 nd (e.g., You're ugly) person viewpoint comments during fMRI. We observed significant group-by-viewpoint interactions within ventral MPFC. Whereas the healthy comparison individuals showed significantly increased (or less decreased) BOLD responses to 1 st relative to 2 nd person viewpoints, the patients showed significantly increased responses to 2 nd relative to 1 st person viewpoints. The reduced BOLD responses to 1 st person viewpoint comments shown by the patients correlated significantly with severity of social anxiety symptom severity. These results underscore the importance of dysfunctional selfreferential processing and MPFC in GSP. We believe that these data reflect a reorganization of self-referential reasoning in the disorder with a self-concept perhaps atypically related to the view of others.