Brain ERPs of depressed patients to complex tones in an oddball task: Relation of reduced P3 asymmetry to physical anhedonia

Author(s): Tenke, C. E., Towey, J. P., Leite, P., Fong, R., Stewart, J. E., Mcgrath, P. J., Quitkin, F. M.

Journal/Book: Psychophysiology. 1998; 35: 40 West 20TH Street, New York, NY 10011-4211. Cambridge Univ Press. 54-63.

Abstract: Event-related potentials to binaural complex tones were recorded from 40 depressed outpatients and 22 normal control participants at 30 electrode sites. Patients did not differ from control participants in N1 or P3 amplitude but showed greater N2. N2 was greater over right than over the left hemisphere at lateral sites in patients and control participants. A P3 asymmetry was found for control participants and patients with low scores on a physical anhedonia scale, but not for patients with high anhedonia scores. Topographic (local Laplacian) maps corresponding to P3 showed greater radial current flow over right than over left central regions in control participants. Patients with high anhedonia did not show this asymmetry, whereas patients with low anhedonia showed an intermediate asymmetry. These findings support the hypothesis that anhedonic depression is associated with dysfunction of right hemisphere mechanisms mediating the processing of complex pitch information.

Note: Article Bruder GE, New York State Psychiat Inst & Hosp, Dept Biopsychol, 722 W 168 St, New York,NY 10032 USA

Keyword(s): depression; P3; asymmetry; anhedonia; EVENT-RELATED POTENTIALS; PERCEPTUAL ASYMMETRY; HEMISPHERIC ASYMMETRIES; MELANCHOLIC DEPRESSION; SCHIZOPHRENIA; PSYCHOPATHOLOGY; ANXIETY; AUDITORY-P3; DYSFUNCTION; LATERALITY

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