Journal Article

FZJ-2020-01095

http://join2-wiki.gsi.de/foswiki/pub/Main/Artwork/join2_logo100x88.png Effects of exogenous testosterone application on network connectivity within emotion regulation systems

Votinov, M. (Corresponding author)FZJ* ; Wagels, L.FZJ* ; Hoffstaedter, F.FZJ* ; Kellermann, T.FZJ* ; Goerlich, K. S. ; Eickhoff, S. B.FZJ* ; Habel, U.FZJ*

2020
Macmillan Publishers Limited, part of Springer Nature [London]

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Please use a persistent id in citations: http://hdl.handle.net/2128/24342  doi:10.1038/s41598-020-59329-0

Abstract: Studies with steroid hormones underlined the vital role of testosterone on social-emotional processing. However, there is still a lack of studies investigating whether testosterone modulates network connectivity during resting-state. Here, we tested how the exogenous application of testosterone would affect functional connectivity between regions implicated in emotion regulation. In total, 96 male participants underwent resting-state fMRI scanning. Before the measurement, half of the subjects received 5 g TestimTM gel (containing 50 mg testosterone) and the other half a corresponding amount of placebo gel. Seeds for the connectivity analysis were meta-analytically defined. First, all regions associated with emotion regulation were chosen via Neurosynth (data driven). Among those, specific seeds were selected and categorized based on the neural model of emotion regulation by Etkin and colleagues (Etkin et al., 2015) (theory-guided). Resting-state connectivity analysis revealed decreased connectivity between the right DLPFC and the right amygdala as well as between the VMPFC and the left IPL for the testosterone group compared to the placebo group. A complementary dynamic causal modeling (DCM) analysis on findings from the resting-state connectivity analysis underlined a bidirectional coupling which was decreased close to zero by testosterone administration. Our results demonstrate that testosterone administration disrupts resting-state connectivity within fronto-subcortical and fronto-parietal circuits. The findings suggest that even without a specific task (e.g. challenge, reward processing) testosterone modulates brain networks important for social-emotional processing.

Note: This work was supported via internal funding by the interdisciplinary center for clinical research (IZKF Aachen; grant number N 7–7) of the School of Medicine, RWTH Aachen University, as a part of a joint project on alterations of neural connectivity. In addition, the project was supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG, IRTG 2150). The funding sources had no role in study design, in the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data, in the writing of the report, and in the decision to submit the article for publication. There are no conflicts of interest.

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Contributing Institute(s):

1. Gehirn & Verhalten (INM-7)
2. Jara-Institut Brain structure-function relationships (INM-10)

Research Program(s):

1. 571 - Connectivity and Activity (POF3-571) (POF3-571)

Appears in the scientific report 2020

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