An investigation of the neural basis of anger attributions in irritable youth.

Neurocognitive models of pediatric irritability suggest a prominent role of anger; however, few studies have investigated anger-related biases and their neural correlates. Resting state functional connectivity (rsFC) of the amygdala was examined in relation to anger attribution bias (AAB) in a sample of young children (5-9 years old; N = 60; 55% White, 26.7% Hispanic) with clinically significant irritability characterized by impairing emotional outbursts (IEOs). Children completed a resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging scan as well as the assessment of children's emotional skills (ACES), which yields three measures of AAB in the context of social situations, social behaviors, and facial expressions. ACES scores were entered into a general linear model to examine associations with rsFC of the bilateral amygdalae. Children with IEOs exhibited significant biases in attributing anger to others across all three ACES domains. Greater biases toward attributing anger in social situations were associated with reduced rsFC of the bilateral amygdalae with the fusiform/lingual gyri and lateral occipital cortex. Alternatively, greater biases toward attributing anger to facial expressions positively predicted right amygdala-precuneus rsFC. Greater bias toward attributing anger to others based on their behaviors was associated with heightened rsFC of the right amygdala with the left middle frontal gyrus. Findings extend previous work implicating functional connections among regions of default mode and frontoparietal networks in pediatric irritability. Longitudinal studies are needed to further investigate the putative role of AAB in the etiology and long-term outcomes of pediatric irritability. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

The Complex Emotion Expression Database: A validated stimulus set of trained actors.

The vast majority of empirical work investigating the mechanisms supporting the perception and recognition of facial expressions is focused on basic expressions. Less is known about the underlying mechanisms supporting the processing of complex expressions, which provide signals about emotions related to more nuanced social behavior and inner thoughts. Here, we introduce the Complex Emotion Expression Database (CEED), a digital stimulus set of 243 basic and 237 complex emotional facial expressions. The stimuli represent six basic expressions (angry, disgusted, fearful, happy, sad, and surprised) and nine complex expressions (affectionate, attracted, betrayed, brokenhearted, contemptuous, desirous, flirtatious, jealous, and lovesick) that were posed by Black and White formally trained, young adult actors. All images were validated by a minimum of 50 adults in a 4-alternative forced choice task. Only images for which ≥ 50% of raters endorsed the correct emotion label were included in the final database. This database will be an excellent resource for researchers interested in studying the developmental, behavioral, and neural mechanisms supporting the perception and recognition of complex emotion expressions.