Naltrexone increases negatively-valenced facial responses to happy faces in female participants

Meier, Isabell M.; Bos, Peter A.; Hamilton, Katie; Stein, Dan J.; Honk, Jack van; Malcolm‐Smith, Susan

doi:10.1016/j.psyneuen.2016.08.022

Cited by 21 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…Indeed, naloxone enhanced acquisition of conditioned fear in humans (Eippert et al, 2008), a finding recently replicated and extended to fear conditioning induced solely through observation (social threat learning; Haaker et al, 2017). Another recent study measured implicit facial mimicry to happy faces and interpreted results as an indication of lowered interest in positive social interaction (Meier et al, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 86%

Morphine reduced perceived anger from neutral and implicit emotional expressions

Løseth

Eikemo

Isager

et al. 2018

Psychoneuroendocrinology

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The μ-opioid system modulates responses to pain and psychosocial stress and mediates non-social and social reward. In humans, the μ-opioid agonist morphine can increase overt attention to the eye-region and visual exploration of faces with neutral expressions. However, little is known about how the human μ-opioid system influences sensitivity to and appraisal of subtle and explicit cues of social threats and reward. Here, we examined the effects of selective μ-opioid stimulation on perception of anger and happiness in faces with explicit, neutral or implicit emotion expressions. Sixty-three healthy adults (32 females) attended two sessions where they received either placebo or 10 mg per oral morphine in randomised order under double-blind conditions. Based on the known μ-opioid reduction of pain and discomfort, as well as reports suggesting that the non-specific partial agonist buprenorphine or the non-specific antagonist naltrexone affect appraisal of social emotional stimuli, we hypothesised that morphine would reduce threat sensitivity and enhance perception of happy facial expressions. While overall perception of others' happiness was unaffected by morphine treatment, morphine reduced perception of anger in stimuli with neutral and implicit expressions without affecting perception of explicit anger. This effect was statistically unrelated to gender, subjective drug effects, mood and autism trait measures. The finding that a low dose of μ-agonist reduced the propensity to perceive anger in photos with subtle facial expressions is consistent with the notion that μ-opioids mediate social confidence and reduce sensitivity to threat cues.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 86%

Morphine reduced perceived anger from neutral and implicit emotional expressions

Løseth

Eikemo

Isager

et al. 2018

Psychoneuroendocrinology

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“…Based on the idea that social affiliation is at least partly driven by basic reward mechanisms, several studies support the idea of BOTSA (Herman and Panksepp, 1978;Panksepp et al, 1980), that the mu-opioid system plays an important role in supporting the formation and maintenance of social affiliation. For example, in human subjects we recently showed an increase of automatic facial responses associated with negative emotions (anger, sadness) in response to happy faces (Meier et al, 2016). Happy faces are considered powerful social reward cues and automatic imitation of happy facial expressions has been shown to promote social affiliation.…”

Section: Social Reward Bonding and Affiliationmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…Happy faces are considered powerful social reward cues and automatic imitation of happy facial expressions has been shown to promote social affiliation. We therefore suggested that blocking the MOR system disrupts the automatic behavioral response involved in social bonding (Meier et al, 2016). A study using positron emission tomography found an increase of MOR activation in response to social acceptance in areas related to reward and social salience processing, namely the ventral striatum, amygdala and insula.…”

Section: Social Reward Bonding and Affiliationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…food stimuli), and deficits in emotion processing (Garland et al, 2017(Garland et al, , 2015; but see Eikemo et al, 2019). Dysregulation of opioid mediated reward mechanisms, for example through experience of chronic stress, as described earlier in relation to fear and stress, may thus lead to a reduction in the experience of pleasure and decrease the sensitivity to social cues that create opportunities to experience positive social interactions (Hsu et al, 2013;Inagaki, 2018;Meier et al, 2016).…”

Section: Social Reward Bonding and Affiliationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A mu-opioid feedback model of human social behavior

Meier

Honk

Bos

et al. 2021

Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews

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“…happy faces) (Wardle, de Wit, 2014) and influences perceptions of social interactions (Frye et al, 2014). Moreover, naltrexone, an antagonist at endogenous opioid receptors, increases negatively-valenced facial expressions to positive faces, interpreted by the authors as an increase in negative responses to affiliative cues (Meier et al, 2016). Finally, the data presented hererin (Mayo et al, 2018) highlights a role for elevated AEA in shaping facial expressions, while the same mechanism has been proposed as a treatment for stress-related psychopathologies (Gunduz-Cinar et al, 2013a, Gunduz-Cinar et al, 2013b; Patel et al, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

In the face of stress: Interpreting individual differences in stress-induced facial expressions

Mayo

Heilig

2019

Neurobiology of Stress

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Stress is an inevitable part of life that can profoundly impact social and emotional functioning, contributing to the development of psychiatric disease. One key component of emotion and social processing is facial expressions, which humans can readily detect and react to even without conscious awareness. Facial expressions have been the focus of philosophic and scientific interest for centuries. Historically, facial expressions have been relegated to peripheral indices of fixed emotion states. More recently, affective neuroscience has undergone a conceptual revolution, resulting in novel interpretations of these muscle movements. Here, we review the role of facial expressions according to the leading affective neuroscience theories, including constructed emotion and social-motivation accounts. We specifically highlight recent data (Mayo et al, 2018) demonstrating the way in which stress shapes facial expressions and how this is influenced by individual factors. In particular, we focus on the consequence of genetic variation within the endocannabinoid system, a neuromodulatory system implicated in stress and emotion, and its impact on stress-induced facial muscle activity. In a re-analysis of this dataset, we highlight how gender may also influence these processes, conceptualized as variation in the “fight-or-flight” or “tend-and-befriend” behavioral responses to stress. We speculate on how these interpretations may contribute to a broader understanding of facial expressions, discuss the potential use of facial expressions as a trans-diagnostic marker of psychiatric disease, and suggest future work necessary to resolve outstanding questions.

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Naltrexone increases negatively-valenced facial responses to happy faces in female participants

Cited by 21 publications

References 16 publications

Morphine reduced perceived anger from neutral and implicit emotional expressions

Morphine reduced perceived anger from neutral and implicit emotional expressions

A mu-opioid feedback model of human social behavior

In the face of stress: Interpreting individual differences in stress-induced facial expressions

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