A brain model of altered self-appraisal in social anxiety disorder

The brain’s default mode network has a central role in the processing of information concerning oneself. Dysfunction in this self-referential processing represents a key component of multiple mental health conditions, particularly social anxiety disorder (SAD). This case-control study aimed to clarify alterations to network dynamics present during self-appraisal in SAD participants. A total of 38 adolescents and young adults with SAD and 72 healthy control participants underwent a self-referential processing fMRI task. The task involved two primary conditions of interest: direct self-appraisal (thinking about oneself) and reflected self-appraisal (thinking about how others might think about oneself). Dynamic causal modeling and parametric empirical Bayes were then used to explore differences in the effective connectivity of the default mode network between groups. We observed connectivity differences between SAD and healthy control participants in the reflected self-appraisal but not the direct self-appraisal condition. Specifically, SAD participants exhibited greater excitatory connectivity from the posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) to medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) and greater inhibitory connectivity from the inferior parietal lobule (IPL) to MPFC. In contrast, SAD participants exhibited reduced intrinsic connectivity in the absence of task modulation. This was illustrated by reduced excitatory connectivity from the PCC to MPFC and reduced inhibitory connectivity from the IPL to MPFC. As such, participants with SAD showed changes to afferent connections to the MPFC which occurred during both reflected self-appraisal as well as intrinsically. The presence of connectivity differences in reflected and not direct self-appraisal is consistent with the characteristic fear of negative social evaluation that is experienced by people with SAD.