Allergic tendencies are associated with larger gray matter volumes

Abstract

Allergic tendencies are associated with important cognitive and physiological factors, such as intelligence and mathematical abilities. Allergies are widely prevalent, especially in modern life, and the reason for its association with important cognitive variables is an intriguing scientific question. However, despite the unique characteristics of cognitive correlates of allergy, the anatomical correlates of allergy remain unknown. The aim of this study was to identify the associations between regional gray matter volume (rGMV) and allergic tendencies in young adults. In a study cohort of 1,219 healthy, educated young adults, we identified a positive correlation between total allergic tendency and rGMV in large anatomical clusters that mainly encompassed the dorsal part of the cerebral neocortex, right anterior insula, and cerebellum. Furthermore,both mean rGMV of the entire part of these clusters and total allergenic tendency showed a significant positive correlation with spatial ability. These results suggest the link among allergic tendencies, larger rGMV, and the better spatial ability in healthy, educated young adults.

The Effects of Family Socioeconomic Status on Psychological and Neural Mechanisms as Well as Their Sex Differences

“…Preprocessing of the T1WIs data was performed using Statistical Parametric Mapping software (SPM12; Wellcome Department of Cognitive Neurology, London, United Kingdom) implemented in Matlab (Mathworks Inc., Natick, MA, United States). The methods for the preprocessing of T1WIs were described in our previous studies and reproduced below (Takeuchi et al, 2018). Using the new segmentation algorithm implemented in SPM12, T1-weighted structural images of each individual were segmented and normalized to the Montreal Neurological Institute (MNI) space to give images with 1.5 × 1.5 × 1.5 mm 3 voxels using diffeomorphic anatomical registration through exponentiated lie algebra (DARTEL) registration process implemented in SPM12.…”

“…Preprocessing and analysis of diffusion data were performed using Statistical Parametric Mapping (SPM) 8 implemented in Matlab. SPM8 instead of SPM12 was used here, this is because our preprocessing procedure was optimized and the quality of preprocessed images was validated using SPM 8 (Takeuchi et al, 2018). The methods for the preprocessing of diffusion data were described in our previous study and reproduced below (Takeuchi et al, 2019).…”

“…The methods for the preprocessing of diffusion data were described in our previous study and reproduced below (Takeuchi et al, 2019). Basically, we normalized MD, FA, gray matter segment [regional gray matter density (rGMD) map], white matter segment [regional white matter density (rWMD) map], cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) segments [regional CSF density (rCSFD) map] of diffusion images of subjects with a previously validated, modified version of DARTEL-based registration process (Takeuchi et al, 2018) method to give images with 1.5 × 1.5 × 1.5 mm 3 voxel size. Then normalized MD images were masked by the custom mask image that is highly likely to be the gray or white matter (see Supplemental Methods for details), the normalized images were smoothed by Gaussian Kernel of 8-mm full width at half maximum (FWHM) and normalized FA images were masked by the custom mask image that is highly likely to be the white matter and then smoothed by Gaussian Kernel of 6-mm FWHM.…”

High Intelligence is not a Risk Factor for Mental Health Disorders

“…With regards to somatic disorders, we replicate the increased risk of allergies in individuals with high intelligence 5,47,50 . One possible explanation for this association is that allergies and intelligence share neural correlates 51 . Another possibility is that more intelligent individuals with a higher g-factor live in more urban areas 52 , where allergies are more prevalent 53 , or that individuals with high intelligence are more aware of allergic symptoms and have better access to health care.…”

Sex-Dependent Effects of theAPOEɛ4 Allele on Behavioral Traits and White Matter Structures in Young Adults

“…Subsequently, the generated rGMV and rWMV images were smoothened by convolving them with an isotropic Gaussian kernel of 8-mm full width at half maximum (FWHM). The descriptions in this paragraph were mostly reproduced from our previous study using the exact same methods ( Takeuchi et al. 2018 ).…”