Experiencing behavioral control over stress can have long-lasting and generalizing effects. Animal research has shown that vmPFC-subcortical interactions are critical for behavioral control; however, research in humans is sparse. Therefore a paradigm was developed in which participants (n = 18) were first assigned to a controllable or uncontrollable version of a signal detection task associated with mild shocks. Subsequently, subjects underwent an fMRI task on the anticipation of speaking in public while measuring self-reported stress, heart rate, and vmPFC network topology. The signal detection task results revealed faster responses to potential shock trials and a trend difference between the controllable and uncontrollable group. The speech anticipation procedure did not show significant between-group differences on self-reported stress or heart rate. fMRI results indicated higher vmPFC efficiency in the controllable threat group at baseline and recovery but similar to the uncontrollable group during speech anticipation. The current report establishes the feasibility of the protocol. However, to evaluate the generalization effect of controllability on the behavioral, physiological, and neural levels further, adequately-powered follow-up research is needed.

中文翻译：

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研究 vmPFC 网络功能的 fMRI 协议的开发是行为控制泛化的基础

对压力进行行为控制可以产生持久和普遍的影响。动物研究表明，vmPFC-皮质下相互作用对于行为控制至关重要；然而，对人类的研究很少。因此，开发了一种范式，其中参与者（n = 18）首先被分配到与轻度冲击相关的信号检测任务的可控或不可控版本。随后，受试者在测量自我报告的压力、心率和 vmPFC 网络拓扑的同时，接受了一项关于预期在公共场合演讲的 fMRI 任务。信号检测任务结果揭示了对潜在冲击试验的更快反应以及可控组和不可控组之间的趋势差异。言语预期程序在自我报告的压力或心率方面没有显示出显着的组间差异。fMRI 结果表明，可控威胁组在基线和恢复时具有更高的 vmPFC 效率，但在语音预期期间与不可控组相似。目前的报告确定了该协议的可行性。然而，为了进一步评估可控性对行为、生理和神经水平的泛化效应，需要有足够动力的后续研究。