Reduced cortical thickness and increased surface area in antisocial personality disorder

Weixiong Jiang, Gang Li, Huasheng Liu, Feng Shi, Tao Wang, Celina Shen, Hui Shen, Seong Whan Lee, Dewen Hu, Wei Wang, Dinggang Shen

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    23 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    Antisocial personality disorder (ASPD), one of whose characteristics is high impulsivity, is of great interest in the field of brain structure and function. However, little is known about possible impairments in the cortical anatomy in ASPD, in terms of cortical thickness (CTh) and surface area (SA), as well as their possible relationship with impulsivity. In this neuroimaging study, we first investigated the changes of CTh and SA in ASPD patients, in comparison to those of healthy controls, and then performed correlation analyses between these measures and the ability of impulse control. We found that ASPD patients showed thinner cortex while larger SA in several specific brain regions, i.e., bilateral superior frontal gyrus (SFG), orbitofrontal and triangularis, insula cortex, precuneus, middle frontal gyrus (MFG), middle temporal gyrus (MTG), and left bank of superior temporal sulcus (STS). In addition, we also found that the ability of impulse control was positively correlated with CTh in the SFG, MFG, orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), pars triangularis, superior temporal gyrus (STG), and insula cortex. To our knowledge, this study is the first to reveal simultaneous changes in CTh and SA in ASPD, as well as their relationship with impulsivity. These cortical structural changes may introduce uncontrolled and callous behavioral characteristic in ASPD patients, and these potential biomarkers may be very helpful in understanding the pathomechanism of ASPD.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)143-152
    Number of pages10
    JournalNeuroscience
    Volume337
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2016 Nov 19

    Bibliographical note

    Publisher Copyright:
    © 2016 IBRO

    Keywords

    • MRI
    • cortical anatomy
    • cortical thickness
    • impulsivity
    • response inhibition
    • surface area

    ASJC Scopus subject areas

    • General Neuroscience

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