Microstructural differences in migraine: A diffusion-tensor imaging study.

BACKGROUND: Diffusion-tensor imaging can be applied to describe the microstructural integrity of the whole brain. As findings about microstructural alterations in migraine are inconsistent, we aimed to replicate the most frequent results and assess a relationship between migraine parameters and changes in microstructure. METHODS: Diffusion-weighted MRI data of 37 migraine patients and 40 controls were collected. Two indices of diffusion of water molecules, fractional anisotropy and mean diffusivity were used in a voxel-wise analysis. Group comparisons were carried out in SPM12 using age and sex as covariates. Statistically significant results survived family-wise error correction (pFWE < 0.05). Migraine intensity, frequency, and duration were self-reported and correlated with mean fractional anisotropy and mean diffusivity values across clusters. RESULTS: Migraine patients showed significantly lower fractional anisotropy in occipital regions, and significantly higher fractional anisotropy in thirteen clusters across the brain. Mean diffusivity of migraine patients was significantly decreased in the cerebellum and pons, but it was not increased in any area. Correlation between migraine duration and fractional anisotropy was significantly positive in the frontal cortex and significantly negative in the superior parietal lobule. CONCLUSION: We suggest that microstructural integrity of the migraine brain is impaired in visual areas and shows duration-related alterations in regions of the default mode network.

The moderating effect of resting heart rate variability on the relationship between pain catastrophizing and depressed mood: an empirical study.

Previous research indicated that pain catastrophizing-a negative emotional and cognitive response toward actual or anticipated pain-could contribute to pain intensity and could be associated with depressive symptoms not just in chronic pain patients but in healthy population as well. Accumulated evidence suggests that resting heart rate variability (HRV) as a putative proxy of emotion regulation could moderate the association of self-reported pain catastrophizing and depressed mood. In the present cross-sectional study, we investigated these associations in a healthy young adult sample controlling for the effect of trait rumination. Seventy-two participants (58 females, mean age = 22.2 ± 1.79 years ranging from 19 to 28 years old) completed the Pain Catastrophizing Scale, the Zung Self-Rating Depression Scale and the Ruminative Response Scale. Resting HRV was measured by time domain metric of HRV, the root mean square of successive differences (RMSSD). The results showed that the relationship between pain catastrophizing and depressive symptoms is significantly moderated by resting HRV (indexed by lnRMSSD). Specifically, in participants with higher resting HRV there was no significant relationship between the two investigated variables, while in participants with relatively low or medium HRV pain catastrophizing and depressed mood showed significant positive association. The relationship remained significant after controlling for sex, age and trait rumination. These results might indicate that measuring pain catastrophizing and depressive symptoms is warranted in non-clinical samples as well and higher resting HRV could have a buffer or protective role against depressive symptoms.

Associations between daily affective experiences, trait and daily rumination on negative and positive affect: a diary study.

BACKGROUND: Rumination has mostly been studied in relation to depression, however, it may also occur in response to positive emotions (i.e., positive rumination) and therefore may be a protective factor related to the maintenance of positive mood. OBJECTIVE: We hypothesized that daily positive and negative affect would be associated with daily positive and negative rumination even after controlling for trait-level rumination. METHOD: We carried out a diary study with university students (n = 178), where participants had to answer short surveys online about their daily affect and daily rumination every evening for 10 days. We analyzed our data with multilevel regression in R. RESULTS: Daily positive and negative affect were significantly associated with daily negative and positive rumination, while trait-level rumination scores were not. Daily and trait-level rumination were moderately correlated (r = 0.333-0.440). CONCLUSIONS: Our findings highlight that daily rumination plays a more significant role in daily emotional experiences than trait rumination across positive and negative valence domains. Daily negative affect appears to be more closely related to higher daily negative rumination than the lack of daily positive rumination, which could be relevant for intervention strategies.

The neural correlates of context driven changes in the emotional response: An fMRI study.

Emotional flexibility reflects the ability to adjust the emotional response to the changing environmental context. To understand how context can trigger a change in emotional response, i.e., how it can upregulate the initial emotional response or trigger a shift in the valence of emotional response, we used a task consisting of picture pairs during functional magnetic resonance imaging sessions. In each pair, the first picture was a smaller detail (a decontextualized photograph depicting emotions using primarily facial and postural expressions) from the second (contextualized) picture, and the neural response to a decontextualized picture was compared with the same picture in a context. Thirty-one healthy participants (18 females; mean age: 24.44 ± 3.4) were involved in the study. In general, context (vs. pictures without context) increased activation in areas involved in facial emotional processing (e.g., middle temporal gyrus, fusiform gyrus, and temporal pole) and affective mentalizing (e.g., precuneus, temporoparietal junction). After excluding the general effect of context by using an exclusive mask with activation to context vs. no-context, the automatic shift from positive to negative valence induced by the context was associated with increased activation in the thalamus, caudate, medial frontal gyrus and lateral orbitofrontal cortex. When the meaning changed from negative to positive, it resulted in a less widespread activation pattern, mainly in the precuneus, middle temporal gyrus, and occipital lobe. Providing context cues to facial information recruited brain areas that induced changes in the emotional responses and interpretation of the emotional situations automatically to support emotional flexibility.

A cross-sectional study on the quality of life in migraine and medication overuse headache in a Hungarian sample: understanding the effect of headache characteristics.

Background and purpose: Previous studies using generic and disease specific instruments showed that both migraine and medication overuse headache are associated with lower health-related quality of life (HRQoL). The aim of our study was to assess HRQoL differences in migraineurs and in patients with MOH and to examine how headache characteristics such as years with headache, aura symptoms, triptan use, headache pain severity and headache frequency are related to HRQoL. Methods: In this cross-sectional study 334 participants were examined (248 were recruited from a tertiary headache centre and 86 via advertisements). The Comp-rehensive Headache-related Quality of life Questionnaire (CHQQ) was used to measure the participants' HRQoL. Data showed normal distribution, therefore beside Chi-squared test parametric tests (e.g. independent samples t-test) were used with a two-tailed p<0.05 threshold. Linear regression models were used to determine the independent effects of sex, age, recruitment method, headache type (migraine vs. MOH) and headache characteristics (presence of aura symptoms, years with headache, headache pain severity, headache frequency and triptan use) separately for each domain and for the total score of CHQQ. Significance threshold was adopted to p0.0125 (0.05/4) to correct for multiple testing and avoid Type I error. Results: Independent samples t-tests showed that patients with MOH had significantly lower scores on all CHQQ domains than migraineurs, except on the social subscale. Results of a series of regression analyses showed that triptan use was inversely related to all the domains of HRQoL after correction for multiple testing (p<0.0125). In addition, headache pain severity was associated with lower physical (p=0.001) and total scores (p=0.002) on CHQQ subscales. Conclusion: Based on the results, different headache characteristics (but not the headache type, namely migraine or MOH) were associated with lower levels of HRQoL in patients with headache. Determining which factors play significant role in the deterioration of HRQoL is important to adequately manage different patient populations and to guide public health policies regarding health service utilization and health-care costs.

Nonproductive thoughts, somatic symptoms and well-being in adolescence: testing the moderator role of age and gender in a representative study.

Background: Previous findings suggest a female preponderance in nonproductive thoughts -rumination and worry-, but studies on gender differences in the strength of the relationship between nonproductive thoughts, somatic symptoms and subjective well-being are scarce. Our aim was to test whether gender and age would moderate these associations. Methods: 1572 adolescents were involved in this representative cross-sectional study (770 boys; mean age = 15.39; SD = 2.26 years). Nonproductive thoughts were measured by Nonproductive Thoughts Questionnaire for Children (NPTQ-C), somatic symptoms were assessed by Somatic Complaint List (SCL), while Mental Health Continuum-Short Form (MHC-SF) was used to measure subjective well-being. To assess the moderation effects of age and gender on the relationship between nonproductive thoughts, somatic symptoms and well-being, four multiple indicator multiple causes (MIMIC) models were defined. Results: Our results suggested that higher rates of nonproductive thoughts predicted a higher level of somatic symptoms and a lower level of subjective well-being. The analyses revealed that although nonproductive thoughts were strongly and equally associated with somatic symptoms among boys and girls, age was a significant moderator. Gender also moderated the relationship between nonproductive thoughts and subjective well-being. Conclusions: Our results support the importance of nonproductive thoughts in somatic symptoms and highlight that the strength of the relationship is similar across both genders but could be dependent upon age. The findings also shed light on the decreased well-being of girls, especially with elevated level of nonproductive thoughts.

Circadian Variation of Migraine Attack Onset Affects fMRI Brain Response to Fearful Faces.

Background: Previous studies suggested a circadian variation of migraine attack onset, although, with contradictory results - possibly because of the existence of migraine subgroups with different circadian attack onset peaks. Migraine is primarily a brain disorder, and if the diversity in daily distribution of migraine attack onset reflects an important aspect of migraine, it may also associate with interictal brain activity. Our goal was to assess brain activity differences in episodic migraine subgroups who were classified according to their typical circadian peak of attack onset. Methods: Two fMRI studies were conducted with migraine without aura patients (n = 31 in Study 1, n = 48 in Study 2). Among them, three subgroups emerged with typical Morning, Evening, and Varying start of attack onset. Whole brain activity was compared between the groups in an implicit emotional processing fMRI task, comparing fearful, sad, and happy facial stimuli to neutral ones. Results: In both studies, significantly increased neural activation was detected to fearful (but not sad or happy) faces. In Study 1, the Evening start group showed increased activation compared to the Morning start group in regions involved in emotional, self-referential (left posterior cingulate gyrus, right precuneus), pain (including left middle cingulate, left postcentral, left supramarginal gyri, right Rolandic operculum) and sensory (including bilateral superior temporal gyrus, right Heschl's gyrus) processing. While in Study 2, the Morning start group showed increased activation compared to the Varying start group at a nominally significant level in regions with pain (right precentral gyrus, right supplementary motor area) and sensory processing (bilateral paracentral lobule) functions. Conclusion: Our fMRI studies suggest that different circadian attack onset peaks are associated with interictal brain activity differences indicating heterogeneity within migraine patients and alterations in sensitivity to threatening fearful stimuli. Circadian variation of migraine attack onset may be an important characteristic to address in future studies and migraine prophylaxis.

Association of plasma tryptophan concentration with periaqueductal gray matter functional connectivity in migraine patients.

Altered periaqueductal gray matter (PAG) functional connectivity contributes to brain hyperexcitability in migraine. Although tryptophan modulates neurotransmission in PAG projections through its metabolic pathways, the effect of plasma tryptophan on PAG functional connectivity (PAG-FC) in migraine has not been investigated yet. In this study, using a matched case-control design PAG-FC was measured during a resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging session in migraine without aura patients (n = 27) and healthy controls (n = 27), and its relationship with plasma tryptophan concentration (TRP) was assessed. In addition, correlations of PAG-FC with age at migraine onset, migraine frequency, trait-anxiety and depressive symptoms were tested and the effect of TRP on these correlations was explored. Our results demonstrated that migraineurs had higher TRP compared to controls. In addition, altered PAG-FC in regions responsible for fear-cascade and pain modulation correlated with TRP only in migraineurs. There was no significant correlation in controls. It suggests increased sensitivity to TRP in migraine patients compared to controls. Trait-anxiety and depressive symptoms correlated with PAG-FC in migraine patients, and these correlations were modulated by TRP in regions responsible for emotional aspects of pain processing, but TRP did not interfere with processes that contribute to migraine attack generation or attack frequency.

Inter-individual differences in pain anticipation and pain perception in migraine: Neural correlates of migraine frequency and cortisol-to-dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate (DHEA-S) ratio.

Previous studies targeting inter-individual differences in pain processing in migraine mainly focused on the perception of pain. Our main aim was to disentangle pain anticipation and perception using a classical fear conditioning task, and investigate how migraine frequency and pre-scan cortisol-to-dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate (DHEA-S) ratio as an index of neurobiological stress response would relate to neural activation in these two phases. Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) data of 23 participants (18 females; mean age: 27.61± 5.36) with episodic migraine without aura were analysed. We found that migraine frequency was significantly associated with pain anticipation in brain regions comprising the midcingulate and caudate, whereas pre-scan cortisol-to DHEA-S ratio was related to pain perception in the pre-supplementary motor area (pre-SMA). Both results suggest exaggerated preparatory responses to pain or more general to stressors, which may contribute to the allostatic load caused by stressors and migraine attacks on the brain.

The interplay of self-critical rumination and resting heart rate variability on subjective well-being and somatic symptom distress: A prospective study.

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this prospective study was to investigate the association of self-critical rumination, autonomic function (indexed by a time domain metric of resting heart rate variability-RMSSD), subjective well-being and somatic symptom distress. METHOD: 84 healthy participants (73 females; mean age = 23.56, SD = 3.35 years) completed the Somatic Symptom Severity Scale of the Patient Health Questionnaire and Mental Health Continuum Short Form at two timepoints (at baseline and six months later). Resting heart rate variability (HRV) was assessed at baseline, along with content specific rumination using the Self-Critical Rumination Scale. Four moderation analyses were performed to test these associations. RESULTS: The interaction between resting HRV and self-critical rumination significantly explained somatic symptom distress at baseline. For those participants who had high resting HRV, somatic symptom distress was basically independent from the level of self-critical rumination. At the same time, lower resting HRV was associated with higher somatic symptom distress, especially in the presence of more ruminative thoughts. Prospectively, however, the interaction between rumination and resting HRV was not a significant predictor of somatic symptom distress. The association between resting HRV and self-critical rumination did not explain the variance on subjective well-being, but subjective well-being was negatively related to self-critical rumination. CONCLUSION: Our findings potentially indicate that self-critical rumination could have a long-term negative impact on psychological functioning, even in a non-clinical sample, and highlight that a lower level of parasympathetic activation, assessed with RMSSD, might be an important factor in the relationship of self-critical rumination and somatic symptom distress.

Validating the bifactor structure of the Ruminative Thought Style Questionnaire-A psychometric study.

The Ruminative Thought Style Questionnaire (RTSQ) is a self-report measure that aims to capture rumination globally, unbiased by depressive symptoms. We explored its psychometric properties among university students (N = 1123), as the existing models about the factor structure of the RTSQ have been inconclusive. In a second study (N = 320) we tested its convergent validity compared to the Ruminative Response Scale (RRS) and its construct validity compared to the Zung Self-rating Depression Scale (ZSDS). The results of Study 1 suggest that the factor structure of the RTSQ is best described with a 19-item bifactor Exploratory Structural Equation Modelling (ESEM), where most of the variance is explained by the general factor. The model was found to be invariant across genders. The correlations in Study 2 demonstrated that the RTSQ is congruent with the RRS, and that rumination captured by the RTSQ is rather maladaptive, as it was more strongly associated with the brooding subscale of the RRS than with reflective pondering. Significant positive associations were found with depressive symptoms, reaffirming the validity of the RTSQ due to the well-known association between rumination and depressive symptoms. Our results support that RTSQ assesses rumination globally, and it is a valid measure of ruminative thinking style that is rather negatively valenced but does not solely focus on depressive mood and symptoms.

Perceived stress in the time of COVID-19: the association with brooding and COVID-related rumination in adults with and without migraine.

BACKGROUND: The main goal of this research was to explore whether migraineurs had a higher level of perceived stress than healthy controls during the times of the coronavirus and related restrictive measures, and to examine the relationship between different subtypes of rumination and perceived stress in these groups. We measured two facets of depressive rumination, brooding and reflection, along with rumination about the current COVID-19 situation to see whether these different subtypes of rumination explained perceived stress among migraineurs and healthy controls. METHODS: Healthy adults (n = 64) and migraine patients (n = 73) filled out self-report questionnaires online. A multiple linear regression model was used to test whether depressive rumination (i.e. brooding and reflection) and COVID-related rumination explained perceived stress among adults with and without migraine during the times of COVID-19, after controlling for gender, age, migraine/control group status and migraine disability. RESULTS: Although we did not find any difference in the level of perceived stress among migraineurs and the control group, perceived stress was more strongly associated with brooding as well as COVID-related rumination among migraineurs than healthy controls. COVID-related rumination and brooding (but not reflection) explained the level of perceived stress after controlling for gender, age, migraine/control group status and migraine disability. CONCLUSIONS: The similar degree of perceived stress among migraineurs and the control group may imply that there is great variation in the personal experience of people regarding the pandemic, that may be determined by numerous other factors. Our results demonstrate that ruminating about the pandemic and related difficulties, as well as brooding (but not reflection) appear to be associated with higher level of perceived stress during the times of the coronavirus. This association was slightly stronger among migraineurs, hinting at the increased vulnerability of this patient group in stressful situations like the COVID-19 pandemic. Our results also suggest that ruminating about the pandemic and its consequences is weakly associated with trait-level depressive rumination, thus may be more contingent on specific factors.

Sex Differences of Periaqueductal Grey Matter Functional Connectivity in Migraine.

The existence of "sex phenotype" in migraine is a long-standing scientific question. Fluctuations of female sex hormones contribute to migraine attacks, and women also have enhanced brain activity during emotional processing and their functional brain networks seem to be more vulnerable to migraine-induced disruption compared to men. Periaqueductal grey matter (PAG) is a core region of pain processing and modulation networks with possible sex-related implications in migraine. In our study, sex differences of PAG functional resting-state connectivity were investigated in the interictal state in 32 episodic migraines without aura patients (16 women and 16 men). A significant main effect of sex was detected in PAG connectivity with postcentral, precentral, and inferior parietal gyri, and further differences were found between right PAG and visual areas (superior occipital gyrus, calcarine, and cuneus), supplementary motor area, and mid-cingulum connectivity. In all cases, PAG functional connectivity was stronger in female migraineurs compared to males. However, higher average pain intensity of migraine attacks correlated with stronger connectivity of PAG and middle temporal, superior occipital, and parietal gyri in male migraineurs compared to females. Migraine-related disability is also associated with PAG connectivity but without sex differences. Our results indicate that sex differences in PAG connectivity with brain regions involved in sensory and emotional aspects of pain might contribute to the "sex-phenotype" in migraine. The stronger functional connectivity between PAG and pain processing areas may be a sign of increased excitability of pain pathways even in resting-state in females compared to male migraineurs, which could contribute to female vulnerability for migraine. However, pain intensity experienced by male migraineurs correlated with increased connectivity between PAG and regions involved in the subjective experience of pain and pain-related unpleasantness. The demonstrated sex differences of PAG functional connectivity may support the notion that the female and male brain is differently affected by migraine.

Regular Practice of Autogenic Training Reduces Migraine Frequency and Is Associated With Brain Activity Changes in Response to Fearful Visual Stimuli.

Several factors can contribute to the development and chronification of migraines, including stress, which is undoubtedly a major trigger. Beyond pharmacotherapy, other treatment methods also exist, including behavioral techniques aiming at reducing patients' stress response. However, the exact brain mechanisms underlying the efficacy of such methods are poorly understood. Our pilot study examined whether the regular practice of autogenic training (AT) induces functional brain changes and if so, how it could be associated with the improvement of migraine parameters. By exploring neural changes through which AT exerts its effect, we can get closer to the pathomechanism of migraine. In particular, we investigated the effect of a headache-specific AT on brain activation using an implicit face emotion processing functional MRI (fMRI) task in female subjects with and without episodic migraine. Our focus was on migraine- and psychological stress-related brain regions. After a 16-week training course, migraineurs showed decreased activation in the migraine-associated dorsal pons to fearful compared with neutral visual stimuli. We also detected decreasing differences in supplementary motor area (SMA) activation to fearful stimuli, and in posterior insula activation to happy stimuli between healthy subjects and migraineurs. Furthermore, migraineurs reported significantly less migraine attacks. These brain activation changes suggest that AT may influence the activity of brain regions responsible for emotion perception, emotional and motor response integration, as well as cognitive control, while also being able to diminish the activation of regions that have an active role in migraine attacks. Improvements induced by the training and the underlying neurophysiological mechanisms are additional arguments in favor of evidence-based personalized behavioral therapies.

Association between migraine frequency and neural response to emotional faces: An fMRI study.

Previous studies have demonstrated that migraine is associated with enhanced perception and altered cerebral processing of sensory stimuli. More recently, it has been suggested that this sensory hypersensitivity might reflect a more general enhanced response to aversive emotional stimuli. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging and emotional face stimuli (fearful, happy and sad faces), we compared whole-brain activation between 41 migraine patients without aura in interictal period and 49 healthy controls. Migraine patients showed increased neural activation to fearful faces compared to neutral faces in the right middle frontal gyrus and frontal pole relative to healthy controls. We also found that higher attack frequency in migraine patients was related to increased activation mainly in the right primary somatosensory cortex (corresponding to the face area) to fearful expressions and in the right dorsal striatal regions to happy faces. In both analyses, activation differences remained significant after controlling for anxiety and depressive symptoms. These findings indicate that enhanced response to emotional stimuli might explain the migraine trigger effect of psychosocial stressors that gradually leads to increased somatosensory response to emotional clues and thus contributes to the progression or chronification of migraine.

The Role of Cognitive Emotion Regulation Strategies in Problem Gaming Among Adolescents: A Nationally Representative Survey Study.

Explanatory theoretical models have proposed an association between problematic online gaming and abilities or strategies in alleviating distress or negative emotions in times of stress as proximal non-gaming-related personality factors. However, there is little research that has targeted how emotion regulation relates to problematic online gaming-especially during adolescence when gaming behavior is most prevalent. In emotion regulation research, there has been a particular emphasis on rumination because it is strongly associated with overall psychopathology. However, it is unknown whether this putatively maladaptive strategy relates to problematic online gaming and whether it is a gender-dependent association. Consequently, the present study examined how emotion regulation strategies, and particularly rumination, related to problem gaming and tested whether gender moderated this relationship in adolescents. In a national representative adolescent sample, 46.9% of the participants (N = 1,646) reported online gaming in the past 12 months and provided information on problematic gaming, and it was these data that were used for further analysis. Their data concerning problematic online gaming and emotion regulation strategies were analyzed, including rumination along with other putatively maladaptive (e.g., catastrophizing) and adaptive (e.g., positive reappraisal) strategies, while controlling for age, gender, and game genre preference. Results of linear regression analyses showed that all the putatively maladaptive emotion regulation strategies (including self-blame, other blame, catastrophizing, and rumination) were positively related to problematic online gaming. Positive reappraisal proved to be a protective factor; it was inversely related to problematic online gaming. In addition, the relationship between rumination and online gaming was moderated by gender (i.e., the relationship was stronger among boys). Based on the results, it is argued that emotion regulation is a useful framework to study problematic online gaming. The present study highlighted that the relative predictive value of rumination for problematic online gaming varied for boys and girls, suggesting that trait rumination might be a gender-specific vulnerability factor for problematic online gaming, but this requires further investigation and replication.

A systematic review of structural and functional MRI studies on pain catastrophizing.

Objectives: Pain catastrophizing is reliably associated with pain reports during experimental pain in healthy, pain-free subjects and in people with chronic pain. It also correlates with self-reports of clinical pain intensity/severity in a variety of disorders characterized by chronic pain in adults, adolescents and children. However, processes, through which it exerts its effects are yet unclear. In this paper, our primary aim was to synthesize neuroimaging research to open a window to possible mechanisms underlying pain catastrophizing in both chronic pain patients and healthy controls. We also aimed to compare whether the neural correlates of pain catastrophizing are similar in these two groups. Methods: PubMed and the Web of Science were searched for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) studies that explored neural correlates of pain catastrophizing. Results: Twenty articles met the inclusion criteria. The results of our review show a connection between pain catastrophizing and brain areas tightly connected to pain perception (including the somatosensory cortices, anterior insula, anterior cingulate cortex and thalamus) and/or modulation (eg, the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex). Our results also highlight that these processes - in relation to pain catastrophizing - are more pronounced in chronic pain patients, suggesting that structural and functional brain alterations (and perhaps mechanisms) related to pain catastrophizing may depend on prior and/or relatively stable/constant pain experience. However, we also found methodological issues and differences that could lead to divergent results. Discussion: Based on our results, pain catastrophizing might be related to salience detection, pain processing, and top-down attentional processes. More research is recommended to explore neural changes to specific types of catastrophizing thoughts (eg, experimentally induced and/or state). Furthermore, we provide ideas regarding pain catastrophizing studies in the future for a more standardized approach.

The association between perseverative cognition and resting heart rate variability: A focus on state ruminative thoughts.

OBJECTIVE: Two studies were conducted to shed light on the associations between trait and state rumination and worry and a time-domain metric of heart rate variability, the root mean square of successive differences (RMSSD) of cardiac interbeat-interval (IBI). METHOD: Study 1 involved 130 healthy adults (118 females; mean age = 23.4 ± 3.59 years), while 72 healthy participants (58 females; mean age = 22.2 ± 1.79 years) were involved in Study 2. RMSSD was calculated from a 5-min baseline recording and state ruminative thoughts were assessed during measurement. Trait perseverative cognitions were measured using self-reported questionnaires. RESULTS: In Study 1, we found that a higher level of state but not trait ruminative thoughts showed weak negative association with lnRMSSD. In Study 2, we replicated the results of Study 1 and we found that trait reflection moderated the relationship between state rumination and lnRMSSD. CONCLUSION: State rumination may reflect actual cardiovascular activity better than trait preservative cognitions, although trait reflection could be a protective factor.

Altered neural activity to monetary reward/loss processing in episodic migraine.

The dysfunctions of the mesolimbic cortical reward circuit have been proposed to contribute to migraine pain. Although supporting empirical evidence was mainly found in connection with primary rewards or in chronic migraine where the pain experience is (almost) constant. Our goal however was to investigate the neural correlates of secondary reward/loss anticipation and consumption using the monetary incentive delay task in 29 episodic migraine patients and 41 headache-free controls. Migraine patients showed decreased activation in one cluster covering the right inferior frontal gyrus during reward consumption compared to controls. We also found significant negative correlation between the time of the last migraine attack before the scan and activation of the parahippocampal gyrus and the right hippocampus yielded to loss anticipation. During reward/loss consumption, a relative increase in the activity of the visual areas was observed the more time passed between the last attack and the scan session. Our results suggest intact reward/loss anticipation but altered reward consumption in migraine, indicating a decreased reactivity to monetary rewards. The findings also raise the possibility that neural responses to loss anticipation and reward/loss consumption could be altered by the proximity of the last migraine attack not just during pre-ictal periods, but interictally as well.

Gender Invariance and Psychometric Properties of the Nonproductive Thoughts Questionnaire for Children.

Perseverative cognitions-rumination and worry-can contribute to mental and somatic health problems in adolescence. Girls usually report stronger rumination or worry than boys even in earlier years across the development age spectrum. Our aim was to test the gender invariance and psychometric properties of the Nonproductive Thoughts Questionnaire for Children (NPTQ-C). Study 1 involved 1,572 students (mean age = 15.39 years, SD = 2.26; 49% boy) recruited representatively from local schools. We applied confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to test the measurement model of perseverative cognitions. The gender invariance of the measurement model and the convergent validity were analyzed as well with CFA with covariates model. The original one-factor structure of NPTQ-C was supported in our adolescent sample. Gender invariance was also confirmed. The NPTQ-C indicated high convergent validity: showing positive correlations with emotional instability and emotional symptoms. In Study 2 (385 students; mean age = 16.05; SD = 1.23; 34% boy), we tested the construct validity of NPTQ-C. The applied CFA with covariates model supported the construct validity. In summary, NPTQ-C proved to be a good instrument for measuring ruminative and worrying thoughts of adolescents, which reliably measures perseverative cognitions across genders.