Shifted inferior frontal laterality in women with major depressive disorder is related to emotion-processing deficits.

BACKGROUND: Facial emotion perception (FEP) is a critical human skill for successful social interaction, and a substantial body of literature suggests that explicit FEP is disrupted in major depressive disorder (MDD). Prior research suggests that weakness in FEP may be an important phenomenon underlying patterns of emotion-processing challenges in MDD and the disproportionate frequency of MDD in women. Method Women with (n = 24) and without (n = 22) MDD, equivalent in age and education, completed a FEP task during functional magnetic resonance imaging. RESULTS: The MDD group exhibited greater extents of frontal, parietal and subcortical activation compared with the control group during FEP. Activation in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) appeared shifted from a left >right pattern observed in healthy women to a bilateral pattern in MDD women. The ratio of left to right suprathreshold IFG voxels in healthy controls was nearly 3:1, whereas in the MDD group, there was a greater percentage of suprathreshold IFG voxels bilaterally, with no leftward bias. In MDD, relatively greater activation in right IFG compared with left IFG (ratio score) was present and predicted FEP accuracy (r = 0.56, p < 0.004), with an inverse relationship observed between FEP and subgenual cingulate activation (r = - 0.46, p = 0.02). CONCLUSIONS: This study links, for the first time, disrupted IFG activation laterality and increased subgenual cingulate activation with deficient FEP in women with MDD, providing an avenue for imaging-to-assessment translational applications in MDD.

The use of pregnancy test kits by college students.

The self-testing product market is experiencing tremendous growth. Technical breakthroughs are allowing tests to be conducted in the home that at one time were possible only in a clinical laboratory. One of the more rapidly expanding components of the self-testing market is home pregnancy test kits. We conducted a study to obtain information about the use of home pregnancy test kits by college students. Questionnaires were distributed to 1,000 women entering the student health service between October 1 and November 4, 1987. A total of 761 (76.1%) questionnaires were completed and returned. Results indicated that approximately 1 out of 6 respondents (17.2%) had used a pregnancy test kit at least once. Of those who had used a test kit, the majority did so because of the speed or confidentiality of obtaining results. The magnitude of test kit use by this sample suggests that college women should be encouraged to use self-testing products as a supplement to but not as a substitute for professional medical care.