Giuseppina Elena Cipriani, Sara Molfese, Fabio Giovannelli, Bahar Güntekin, Neri Vitali, Rachele Marcato, Martina Amanzio
{"title":"Executive Control from Healthy Ageing to Cognitive Impairment: A Systematic Review of Stroop and Simon effects using Psychophysiological and Imaging Techniques.","authors":"Giuseppina Elena Cipriani, Sara Molfese, Fabio Giovannelli, Bahar Güntekin, Neri Vitali, Rachele Marcato, Martina Amanzio","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106121","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106121","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>The prevalence of cognitive impairment and dementia in the ageing population emphasises the need for strategies to mitigate cognitive decline. While research on Alzheimer's Disease (AD) has focused on early risk factors, less attention has been paid to protective factors such as cognitive reserve (CR) and cognitive control (CC).</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>This review examines age-related changes in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) in healthy ageing and cognitive impairment. We analysed studies using Stroop and Simon tasks in conjunction with EEG, EEG/ERP, fNIRS and fMRI.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Of the 1411 articles reviewed, 49 studies met our criteria. The results suggest that the Stroop and Simon effects are essential for distinguishing between healthy ageing and cognitive impairment. Increased activity of the PFC supports task performance, especially in cognitive ageing. However, when compensatory mechanisms fail, deficits in Stroop and Simon effects may indicate cognitive impairment and reduced activation of the PFC.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>This review emphasises the critical role of CR in attenuating age-related cognitive decline and highlights the importance of the PFC in maintaining CC.</p>","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":" ","pages":"106121"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143733354","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Pathological forgetting from a predictive processing perspective","authors":"Elva Arulchelvan , Sven Vanneste","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106109","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106109","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Recent research suggests that natural forgetting is beneficial, allowing the brain to prioritize relevant information and disregard the irrelevant, thus aiding decision-making and mental health. Conversely, pathological conditions may arise from disruptions in these memory control processes. Without adequate memory control capacities, individuals can suffer from conditions like PTSD or addiction (where unwanted or addiction-related memories persist) on one end of the scale, to conditions such as dementia, Parkinson’s disease or traumatic brain injury, which are characterised by heightened rates of forgetting on the other side. This review will explore the concept of predictive processing as a potential mechanism underlying pathological forgetting. It will summarise the neurobiological basis of predictive processing and how it influences what we remember or forget. As evident in the emerging literature, this has distinct implications for understanding pathological forgetting in psychological disorders. Finally, this review will highlight therapeutic interventions that have recently targeted predictive processes and consequently improved symptoms related to forgetting, suggesting translational applications for treatment approaches in these conditions.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":"172 ","pages":"Article 106109"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143697982","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Freya Prentice , Lara Chehabeddine , Maria Helena Eriksson , Jennifer Murphy , Leigh N. Sepeta , William D. Gaillard , Madison M. Berl , Frédérique Liégeois , Torsten Baldeweg
{"title":"Is an earlier onset of focal epilepsy associated with atypical language lateralization? A systematic review, meta-analysis and new data","authors":"Freya Prentice , Lara Chehabeddine , Maria Helena Eriksson , Jennifer Murphy , Leigh N. Sepeta , William D. Gaillard , Madison M. Berl , Frédérique Liégeois , Torsten Baldeweg","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106110","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106110","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Right and bilateral language representation is common in focal epilepsy, possibly reflecting the influence of epileptogenic lesions and/or seizure activity in the left hemisphere. Atypical language lateralization is assumed to be more likely in cases of early seizure onset, due to greater language plasticity in childhood. However, evidence for this association is mixed, with most research based on small samples and heterogenous cohorts. In this preregistered meta-analysis we examined the association between age at seizure onset and fMRI-derived language lateralization in individuals with focal epilepsy. The pooled effect size demonstrated a correlation between an earlier onset and rightward language lateralization in the total sample (r = 0.1, p = .005, k = 58, n = 1240), with no difference in the correlation between age at seizure onset and language lateralization between left and right hemisphere epilepsy samples (Q=62.03, p = .302). In exploratory analyses of the individual participant data (n = 1157), we demonstrated strong evidence that a logarithmic model fits the data better than a linear (BF=350) or categorical model with 6 years of age as a cut-off (BF=36). These findings indicate that there is a small but significant relationship between age at seizure onset and language lateralization. The relationship was consistent with theories of language plasticity proposing an exponential decline in plasticity over early childhood. However, given that this effect was subtle and only found in larger sample sizes, an early age at seizure onset would not serve as a good indicator of atypical language lateralization on the individual patient level.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":"172 ","pages":"Article 106110"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143712279","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Charles F. Zorumski , Douglas F. Covey , Yukitoshi Izumi , Alex S. Evers , Jamie L. Maguire , Steven J. Mennerick
{"title":"New directions in neurosteroid therapeutics in neuropsychiatry","authors":"Charles F. Zorumski , Douglas F. Covey , Yukitoshi Izumi , Alex S. Evers , Jamie L. Maguire , Steven J. Mennerick","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106119","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106119","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In recent years three neuroactive steroids (NAS), brexanolone (allopregnanolone, AlloP), ganaxolone and zuranolone, have been approved for the treatment of neuropsychiatric illnesses including postpartum depression and seizures in a neurodevelopmental syndrome. The approved agents are pregnane steroids and strong positive allosteric modulators (PAMs) of gamma-aminobutyric acid type A receptors (GABA<sub>A</sub>Rs). Broad effects on GABA<sub>A</sub>Rs play important roles in therapeutic benefits. However, these NAS also have actions on non-GABAR targets that could be important for clinical outcomes. Thus, understanding the broader effects of NAS is potentially important for expanding the therapeutic landscape of these important modulators. The approved NAS as well as other structurally distinct NAS and oxysterols have effects on non-GABA<sub>A</sub>R receptors and ion channels, along with intracellular actions that could have therapeutic importance, including modulation of cellular stress mechanisms, neuroinflammation, mitochondrial function and autophagy, among others. In this review, we explore GABAergic and other cellular effects of pregnane steroids including novel molecules that have potential therapeutic importance. This work discusses the complex chemical nature of NAS and what is being learned at cellular, molecular, synaptic and brain network levels about key sites of action including GABA<sub>A</sub>Rs and other targets.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":"172 ","pages":"Article 106119"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143697981","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Joshua Kugel, Ruben E Laukkonen, David B Yaden, Murat Yücel, Paul Liknaitzky
{"title":"Insights on Psychedelics: A Systematic Review of Therapeutic Effects.","authors":"Joshua Kugel, Ruben E Laukkonen, David B Yaden, Murat Yücel, Paul Liknaitzky","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106117","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106117","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Insight - a sudden change in understanding or perspective that feels true or reliable - is a common occurrence during psychedelic experiences, and often considered by clinicians and patients to be central to their therapeutic value. However, their occurrence and role has not been systematically assessed.</p><p><strong>Objectives: </strong>We reviewed all peer-reviewed studies that published data on insight catalysed by a classic psychedelic at psychoactive levels, to elucidate several aspects of psychedelic-catalysed insight, including its prevalence, relationship to dose, time-course, and relationship to therapeutic outcomes. Risk of bias was assessed regarding selection, reliability, causality, and transparency. PROSPERO registration: CRD42023405854 FINDINGS: The final database and key bibliography searches were completed on July 13, 2024. We screened 741 abstracts and included 98 studies (40 survey, 58 interventional). Insight was positively correlated with psychedelic dose, and was significantly higher following psychedelics in 43 of 46 (93%) studies that presented a comparison to a placebo condition. Crucially, 25 of 29 studies (86%) found that insight was associated with therapeutic improvement, and this relationship was often stronger than mystical-type experience, which has received more research attention.</p><p><strong>Interpretation: </strong>This review indicates that psychedelic-catalysed insight is associated with therapeutic improvement, suggesting its importance for clinical practice and for understanding the mechanisms of psychedelic therapy.</p><p><strong>Limitations: </strong>Heterogeneous study designs and operationalisations of insight precluded a meta-analytic summary. Publication bias and selective reporting is possible, given insight was typically not a primary outcome of the included studies.</p><p><strong>Funding: </strong>This study was not supported by any external funding.</p>","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":" ","pages":"106117"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143702233","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Danielle L. Kurtin , Anusha M. Prabhu , Qasim Hassan , Alissa Groen , Matthew J. Amer , Anne Lingford-Hughes , Louise M. Paterson
{"title":"Differences in fMRI-based connectivity during abstinence or interventions between heroin-dependent individuals and healthy controls","authors":"Danielle L. Kurtin , Anusha M. Prabhu , Qasim Hassan , Alissa Groen , Matthew J. Amer , Anne Lingford-Hughes , Louise M. Paterson","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106116","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106116","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The substantial personal, societal, and economic impacts of opioid addiction drive research investigating how opioid addiction affects the brain, and whether therapies attenuate addiction-related metrics of brain function. Evaluating the connectivity between brain regions is a useful approach to characterise the effects of opioid addiction on the brain. This work is a systematic narrative review of studies investigating the effect of abstinence or interventions on connectivity in people who are dependent on heroin (HD) and healthy controls (HC). We found that HD typically showed weaker connectivity than HC between three functional networks: the Executive Control Network, Default Mode Network, and the Salience Network. Abstinence and Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) both attenuated differences in connectivity between HD and HC, often by strengthening connectivity in HD. We observed that increased connectivity due to abstinence or TMS consistently related to decreased craving/risk of relapse. Using these findings, we present an “urge and action framework” relating therapeutic factors contributing to craving/relapse, connectivity results, and neurobiological models of HD. To inform future research, we critically assessed the impact of study design and analysis methods on study results. We conclude that the weaker between-network connectivity in HD and HC and its relationship to craving/relapse merits further exploration as a biomarker and target for therapeutic interventions.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":"172 ","pages":"Article 106116"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143694600","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Episodic contributions to predictive learning","authors":"Nina Rouhani , Vishnu P. Murty","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106122","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106122","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":"172 ","pages":"Article 106122"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143697983","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Yunlin Mao , Linlin Fan , Chunliang Feng , Zhengjia Dai
{"title":"Predicting responses of neuromodulation and psychotherapies for major depressive disorder: A coordinate-based meta-analysis of functional magnetic resonance imaging studies","authors":"Yunlin Mao , Linlin Fan , Chunliang Feng , Zhengjia Dai","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106120","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106120","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This meta-analysis synthesized resting-state functional connectivity (FC) patterns associated with treatment responses in Major Depressive Disorder (MDD). We evaluated studies from 2013 to 2023 that reported pre-treatment FC (i.e., ‘biomarker’ analysis) and/or treatment-induced FC alterations (i.e., ‘longitudinal effects’) in three treatments (i.e., transcranial magnetic stimulation, electroconvulsive therapy, psychotherapy), and further associated these patterns with gene expression, neurotransmitter distributions, and symptomatology. From 57 studies covering 1726 patients, the ‘biomarker’ results revealed significant rs-FC patterns in the Default Mode Network (DMN) and Frontoparietal Network (FPN). ‘Longitudinal effects’ were characterized by altered DMN connectivity. Psychotherapy primarily affected the visual network and DMN. Gene expression profiles explained 38.5 % and 56.0 % of the variance in ‘biomarker’ and ‘longitudinal’ results, respectively. The meta-analysis correlated with neurotransmitter distributions (e.g., serotonin, dopamine) and MDD-related terms (‘interaction’, ‘emotional’, ‘negative’). These findings indicate that baseline FC within the DMN and FPN is crucial for predicting treatment responses, and the core mechanisms may involve restoring the DMN. This work may enhance our understanding of MDD pathophysiology and help guide personalized interventions.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":"172 ","pages":"Article 106120"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143694625","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Beyond impulse control – toward a comprehensive neural account of future-oriented decision making","authors":"Georgia E. Kapetaniou , Alexander Soutschek","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106115","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106115","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The dominant focus of current neural models of future-oriented decision making is on the interplay between the brain’s reward system and a frontoparietal network thought to implement impulse control. Here, we propose a re-interpretation of the contribution of frontoparietal activation to future-oriented behavior and argue that future-oriented decisions are influenced by a variety of psychological mechanisms implemented by dissociable brain mechanisms. We review the literature on the neural mechanisms underlying the influence of prospection, retrospection, framing, metacognition, and automatization on future-oriented decisions. We propose that the prefrontal cortex contributes to future-oriented decisions not by exerting impulse control but by constructing and updating the value of abstract future rewards. These prefrontal value representations interact with regions involved in reward processing (neural reward system), prospection (hippocampus, temporal cortex), metacognition (frontopolar cortex), and habitual behavior (dorsal striatum). The proposed account of the brain mechanisms underlying future-oriented decisions has several implications for both basic and clinical research: First, by reconciling the idea of frontoparietal control processes with construal accounts of intertemporal choice, we offer an alternative interpretation of the canonical prefrontal activation during future-oriented decisions. Second, we highlight the need for obtaining a better understanding of the neural mechanisms underlying future-oriented decisions beyond impulse control and of their contribution to myopic decisions in clinical disorders. Such a widened focus may, third, stimulate the development of novel neural interventions for the treatment of pathological impulsive decision making.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":"172 ","pages":"Article 106115"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143679709","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The double-edged sword of stress: A systematic meta-analysis on how stress impacts creativity","authors":"Yi Huang , Rongjun Yu","doi":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106113","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.neubiorev.2025.106113","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The present study provides up-to-date meta-analytical estimates of the impact of experimentally induced stress on individuals’ creative performance. Using a three-level meta-analytic model, we observed an overall negative effect of stress on creativity (d = −0.20). Our analysis reveals that this relationship is nuanced, and influenced by a variety of factors. Social-evaluative threats (SETs) did not significantly affect creativity overall (d = −0.08). Specifically, tests significantly reduced creativity, while competition showed a non-significant positive trend and (expected) performance evaluation showed a non-significant negative trend. Furthermore, results showed that mild SETs (one element) slightly but not significantly increased creativity, whereas severe SETs (three elements) significantly decreased it, indicating a curvilinear relationship. Non-social stressors, including time pressure and physical stress, significantly hindered creative performance (d = −0.45), with challenging tasks also showing a negative but non-significant effect. Additionally, the impact of stress on creativity varied by age group. Children’s creativity was notably reduced by competition, physical stress, and challenging tasks, whereas adults and adolescents’ creativity appeared to benefit from competition. Adults’ creative performance was most negatively impacted by time pressure and remained relatively stable across other stressors. These findings underscore the complex and multifaceted nature of the effects of stress on creativity. The theoretical and practical implications are discussed.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":56105,"journal":{"name":"Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews","volume":"172 ","pages":"Article 106113"},"PeriodicalIF":7.5,"publicationDate":"2025-03-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"143679710","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}