Hostname: page-component-669899f699-b58lm Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-04-25T03:23:57.377Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Rumination in bipolar disorder associated with brain network and behavioural measures of inhibitory executive control

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 August 2023

Tina Chou Open the ORCID record for Tina Chou [Opens in a new window] ,
Darin D. Dougherty ,
Andrew A. Nierenberg  and
Sharmin Ghaznavi
Tina Chou
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, USA
Darin D. Dougherty
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, USA
Andrew A. Nierenberg
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, USA
Sharmin Ghaznavi*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School, Charlestown, MA, USA
*
Corresponding author: Sharmin Ghaznavi; Email: sghaznavi@mgh.harvard.edu.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Objective:

Rumination is a passive form of negative self-focused cognition that predicts depressive episodes for individuals with bipolar disorder (BD). Individuals with BD also have impaired inhibitory executive control; rumination in BD may therefore reflect executive dysfunction. We investigated the relationship between a neural measure of executive functioning (functional connectivity between the frontoparietal control network [FPCN] and the default mode network [DMN] during an effortful task), behavioural measures of executive functioning (the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function) and rumination (the Ruminative Responses Scale).

Methods:

Fifteen individuals with BD and fifteen healthy controls underwent MRI scans during mental distraction. Using CONN toolbox, between-network FPCN-DMN connectivity values were calculated. We conducted Pearson’s r bivariate correlations between connectivity values, BRIEF and RRS scores.

Results:

RRS scores were positively correlated with BRIEF Behavioral Regulation Index (BRI) scores. In individuals with BD, there was a positive correlation between FPCN-DMN functional connectivity during distraction and BRIEF BRI scores. FPCN-DMN functional connectivity was also positively correlated with RRS ruminative brooding scores. Healthy controls did not show significant correlations between these behavioural and neural measures of executive functioning and rumination.

Conclusion:

For individuals with BD, the greater the tendency to ruminate and the higher the executive dysfunction, the stronger the connectivity between an executive control network and a network involved in rumination during an unrelated cognitive task. This could reflect continual attempts to inhibit ruminative thinking and shift back to the distraction task. Therefore, engagement in rumination may reflect failed inhibitory executive control.

Keywords

RuminationExecutive functionCognitionBipolar disorderDefault mode network
Type
Original Article
Information
Acta Neuropsychiatrica , Volume 36 , Issue 1 , February 2024 , pp. 39 - 43
Check for updates
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Scandinavian College of Neuropsychopharmacology

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Berman, MG, Peltier, S, Nee, DE, Kross, E, Deldin, PJ and Jonides, J (2011) Depression, rumination and the default network. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience 6(5), 548–555. DOI: 10.1093/scan/nsq080.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Buckner, RL, Andrews-Hanna, JR and Schacter, DL (2008) The brain’s default network: anatomy, function, and relevance to disease. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1124, 1–38.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, LD and Nolen-Hoeksema, S (1994) Gender differences in response to depressed mood in a college sample. Sex Roles 30, 331–346.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chou, T, Dougherty, DD, Nierenberg, AA and Deckersbach, T (2022) Restoration of default mode network and task positive network anti-correlation associated with mindfulness-based cognitive therapy for bipolar disorder. Psychiatry Research Neuroimaging 319, 111419. DOI: 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2021.111419.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ciszewski, S, Francis, K, Mendella, P, Bissada, H and Tasca, GA (2014) Validity and reliability of the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function-Adult Version in a clinical sample with eating disorders. Eating Behaviors 15(2), 175–181. DOI: 10.1016/j.eatbeh.2014.01.004.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cotrena, C, Branco, LD, Ponsoni, A, Samame, C, Shansis, FM and Fonseca, RP (2020) Executive functions and memory in bipolar disorders I and II: new insights from meta-analytic results. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica 141, 110–130.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Davis, RN and Nolen-Hoeksema, S (2000) Cognitive inflexibility among ruminators and nonruminators. Cognitive Therapy and Research 24, 699–711.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fox, MD, Snyder, AZ, Vincent, JL, Corbetta, M, Van Essen, DC and Raichle, ME (2005) The human brain is intrinsically organized into dynamic, anticorrelated functional networks. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 102(27), 9673–9678. DOI: 10.1073/pnas.0504136102.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ghaznavi, S, Chou, T, Dougherty, DD and Nierenberg, AA (2023) Differential patterns of default mode network activity associated with negative and positive rumination in bipolar disorder. Journal of Affective Disorders 323, 607–616. DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2022.12.014.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ghaznavi, S and Deckersbach, T (2012) Rumination in bipolar disorder: evidence for an unquiet mind. Biology of Mood & Anxiety Disorders 2, 2. DOI: 10.1186/2045-5380-2-2.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gioia, GA, Isquith, PK, Guy, SC and Kenworthy, L (2000) Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function: BRIEF. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources.Google Scholar
Hamilton, JP, Furman, DJ, Chang, C, Thomason, ME, Dennis, E and Gotlib, IH (2011) Default-mode and task-positive network activity in major depressive disorder: implications for adaptive and maladaptive rumination. Biological Psychiatry 70(4), 327–333. DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2011.02.003.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hamilton, M (1960) A rating scale for depression. Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry 23(1), 56–62. DOI: 10.1136/jnnp.23.1.56.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Larson, ER, Shear, PK, Krikorian, R, Welge, J and Strakowski, SM (2005) Working memory and inhibitory control among manic and euthymic patients with bipolar disorder. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society 11, 163–172.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nolen-Hoeksema, S (2000) The role of rumination in depressive disorders and mixed anxiety/depressive symptoms. Journal of Abnormal Psychology 109(3), 504–511. DOI: 10.1037/0021-843X.109.3.504.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nolen-Hoeksema, S and Morrow, J (1991) A prospective study of depression and posttraumatic stress symptoms after a natural disaster: the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 61(1), 115–121.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Qin, P and Northoff, G (2011) How is our self related to midline regions and the default-mode network? NeuroImage 57, 1221–1233.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sheehan, DV, Lecrubier, Y, Sheehan, KH, Amorim, P, Janavs, J, Weiller, E, Hergueta, T, Baker, R and Dunbar, GC (1998) The Mini-International Neuropsychiatric Interview (M.I.N.I.): the development and validation of a structured diagnostic psychiatric interview for DSM-IV and ICD-10. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry 59(Suppl 20), 22–33.Google ScholarPubMed
Spreng, RN, Stevens, WD, Chamberlain, JP, Gilmore, AW and Schacter, DL (2010) Default network activity, coupled with the frontoparietal control network, supports goal-directed cognition. NeuroImage 53(1), 303–317.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Treynor, W, Gonzalez, R and Nolen-Hoeksema, S (2003) Rumination reconsidered: a psychometric analysis. Cognitive Therapy and Research 27(3), 247–259. DOI: 10.1023/A:1023910315561.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Watkins, E and Brown, R (2002) Rumination and executive function in depression: an experimental study. Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry 72, 400–402.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Watkins, ER, Mullan, E, Wingrove, J, Rimes, K, Steiner, H, Bathurst, N, Eastman, R and Scott, J (2011) Rumination-focused cognitive-behavioural therapy for residual depression: phase II randomised controlled trial. The British Journal of Psychiatry 199(4), 317–322.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wechsler, D (2001) Wechsler Test of Adult Reading: WTAR. San Antonio, TX: Psychological Corporation.Google Scholar
Whitfield-Gabrieli, S and Nieto-Castanon, A (2012) CONN: a functional connectivity toolbox for correlated and anticorrelated brain networks. Brain Connect 2, 125–141. DOI: 10.1089/brain.2012.0073.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Whitmer, AJ and Banich, MT (2007) Inhibition versus switching deficits in different forms of rumination. Psychological Science 18, 546–553.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Yeo, BT, Krienen, FM, Sepulcre, J, Sabuncu, MR, Lashkari, D, Hollinshead, M, Roffman, JL, Smoller, JW, Zollei, L, Polimeni, JR, Fischl, B, Liu, H and Buckner, RL (2011) The organization of the human cerebral cortex estimated by intrinsic functional connectivity. Journal of Neurophysiology 106(3), 1125–1165. DOI: 10.1152/jn.00338.2011.Google ScholarPubMed
Young, RC, Biggs, JT, Ziegler, VE and Meyer, DA (1978) A rating scale for mania: reliability, validity and sensitivity. British Journal of Psychiatry 133, 429–435. DOI: 10.1192/bjp.133.5.429.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Zhu, X, Zhu, Q, Shen, H, Liao, W and Yuan, F (2017) Rumination and default mode network subsystems connectivity in first-episode, drug-naive young patients with major depressive disorder. Scientific Reports 7, 43105. DOI: 10.1038/srep43105.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed