Individual differences in the proneness to have flow experiences are linked to dopamine D2-receptor availability in the dorsal striatum

Flow is a subjective experience of high but effortless attention, enjoyment, and low self-awareness that can occur during the active performance of challenging tasks. The dispositional proneness to experience flow is associated with personality traits that are known to be influenced by dopaminergic neural systems. Here, for the first time, we investigated relations between flow proneness and dopaminergic function. Specifically, we tested the hypothesis that the availability of dopamine D2-receptors in the striatum is positively associated with flow proneness. Striatal D2-receptor availability was measured in a sample of 25 healthy adults using positron emission tomography and [ 11 C]raclopride. Flow proneness was measured using the Swedish Flow Proneness Questionnaire. As hypothesized, there was a significant correlation (r = .41) between striatal D2-receptor availability and flow proneness. An exploratory analysis of striatal subregions showed that the relation was mainly driven by the dorsal striatum, with a significantly higher correlation in the putamen than in the ventral striatum. The findings constitute the first demonstration of an association between flow proneness and dopaminergic function. We suggest that the proneness to experience flow is related to personality dimensions that are under dopaminergic control and characterized by low impulsiveness, stable emotion, and positive affect

D2/D3 dopamine receptor binding with [F-18]fallypride correlates of executive function in medication-naïve patients with schizophrenia

Converging evidence indicates that the prefrontal cortex is critically involved in executive control and that executive dysfunction is implicated in schizophrenia. Reduced dopamine D2/D3 receptor binding potential has been reported in schizophrenia, and the correlations with neuropsychological test scores have been positive and negative for different tasks. The aim of this study was to examine the relation between dopamine D2/D3 receptor levels with frontal and temporal neurocognitive performance in schizophrenia. Resting-state 18F-fallypride positron emission tomography was performed on 20 medication-naïve and 5 previously medicated for brief earlier periods patients with schizophrenia and 19 age- and sex-matched healthy volunteers. Striatal and extra-striatal dopamine D2/D3 receptor levels were quantified as binding potential using fallypride imaging. Magnetic resonance images in standard Talairach position and segmented into gray and white matter were co-registered to the fallypride images, and the AFNI stereotaxic atlas was applied. Two neuropsychological tasks known to activate frontal and temporal lobe function were chosen, specifically the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST) and the California Verbal Learning Test (CVLT). Images of the correlation coefficient between fallypride binding and WCST and CVLT performance showed a negative correlation in contrast to positive correlations in healthy volunteers. The results of this study demonstrate that lower fallypride binding potential in patients with schizophrenia may be associated with better performance. Our findings are consistent with previous studies that failed to find cognitive improvements with typical dopamine-blocking medications

The Neuroscience of Positive Emotions and Affect:Implications for Cultivating Happiness and Wellbeing

This review paper provides an integrative account regarding neurophysiological correlates of positive emotions and affect that cumulatively contribute to the scaffolding for happiness and wellbeing in humans and other animals. This paper reviews the associations among neurotransmitters, hormones, brain networks, and cognitive functions in the context of positive emotions and affect. Consideration of lifespan developmental perspectives are incorporated, and we also examine the impact of healthy social relationships and environmental contexts on the modulation of positive emotions and affect. The neurophysiological processes that implement positive emotions are dynamic and modifiable, and meditative practices as well as flow states that change patterns of brain function and ultimately support wellbeing are also discussed. This review is part of "The Human Affectome Project" (http://neuroqualia.org/background.php), and in order to advance a primary aim of the Human Affectome Project, we also reviewed relevant linguistic dimensions and terminology that characterizes positive emotions and wellbeing. These linguistic dimensions are discussed within the context of the neuroscience literature with the overarching goal of generating novel recommendations for advancing neuroscience research on positive emotions and wellbeing

Striatal Activity is Associated with Deficits of Cognitive Control and Aberrant Salience for Patients with Schizophrenia

A recent study has shown that the locus of the largest known dopamine abnormality between patients with schizophrenia and healthy controls is in the associative striatum (Kegeles et al., 2010). This dopamine abnormality in the associative striatum is thought to bring about aberrant salience assignment for patients, which may underlie symptoms of psychosis like delusions and hallucinations (Howes & Kapur, 2009). Interestingly, the associative striatum has segregated, looped, connectivity with cortical regions including the prefrontal and parietal cortices (Draganski et al., 2008; Redgrave, Vautrelle, & Reynolds, 2011) and computational models have suggested that it may function as an information gate during cognitive control (Frank, Loughry, & O\u27Reilly, 2001; Gruber, Dayan, Gutkin, & Solla, 2006), much the way that posterior portions of the striatum gate motor control (Chevalier & Deniau, 1990). The current study sought to explore the relationship between striatal involvement in cognition and aberrant salience symptom expression using a novel task of cognitive control. We examined aberrant salience using a self-report measure (Cicero et al., 2010) and core components of cognitive control (updating, interference control, and simple maintenance), that are critically reliant on intact information gating, in a sample of 22 patients with schizophrenia and 20 healthy controls using a slow event-related fMRI design. We predicted that 1) aberrant salience symptoms would be greater for patients than controls, 2) that patients would demonstrate increased errors during interference controls trials, given that patients may be inappropriately assigning salience to distracters, and 3) that striatal activity during those errors could be positively correlated with aberrant salience symptoms. We found a trend toward significant differences between patients and controls on aberrant salience symptom presence, and a significant difference between groups during updating performance. During interference control trials, although we found no difference between groups when participants were tasked with maintaining targets during distracter presentation, patients were more likely to make errors when probed with those distracters, suggesting inappropriate distracter updating. When examining the brain activity during correct and incorrect updating and interference control trials, for patients update trial activity in the prefrontal cortex and striatum was significantly lower for incorrect updating trials when compared to correct updating trials, and significantly greater when patients inappropriately identified the distracter as correct compared with trials when they correctly rejected the distracter. Activity did not differ between correct and incorrect updating or interference control trials for controls. Further, we found that for patients, as predicted, the increase of activity during incorrect distracter trials was positively correlated with aberrant salience symptoms, but only for the associative striatal region and not the prefrontal region. We found no relationship between aberrant salience and patient brain activity during correct distracter trials, nor did we find significant relationships between aberrant salience and brain activity during either updating or interference control trials for controls. These results demonstrate that cognitive control deficits of patients demonstrate some domain selectivity, given that we found some evidence for preserved simple maintenance and maintenance in the face of task relevant distracter performance, but impaired performance at updating and ignoring distracters. Finally, we found evidence demonstrating a relationship between aberrant salience symptom expression for patients, cognitive deficits, and associative striatal activity. This relationship may have implications for treatments that improve cognitive function and reduce symptom expression

Dopaminergic mechanisms underlying psychosis

Schizophrenia is a potentially devastating mental illness with a complex aetiology, in which the odds ratios for environmental risk factors for the disorder are greater than the odds ratios of any single gene hitherto identified. Within schizophrenia, striatal dopamine dysfunction has been proposed to underlie the development of psychosis. The Aberrant Salience hypothesis provides an explanatory model based on empirical findings to explain how psychotic symptoms may arise from striatal hyperdopaminergia, whereby multiple risk factors converge to elevate striatal dopamine synthesis capacity as the Final Common Pathway to psychosis. Two important epidemiological risk factors for the disorder are chronic cannabis use and longterm psychosocial stress, both of which have evidence supporting effects on the dopamine system. Environmental risk factors are by their very nature modifiable, and so this thesis examined whether these environmental risk factors were associated with the same dopaminergic abnormalities that have been observed in schizophrenia with 3,4-dihydroxy-6- [18F]-fluoro-l-phenylalanine Positron Emission Tomography. This thesis also examined whether cannabis users exhibit aberrant salience processing using a behavioural task, the Salience Attribution Task. This thesis found that long-term cannabis use was associated with reduced dopamine synthesis capacity and no relationship was found between striatal dopamine synthesis capacity and cannabis-induced psychotic-like symptoms. Whilst cannabis use was not associated with increased aberrant salience processing, there was a relationship between cannabis-induced psychotic-like symptoms and aberrant salience processing. This thesis found that long-term psychosocial stress is associated with reduced dopamine synthesis capacity, although this finding may be due confounding factors. However, a positive relationship was observed between childhood and recent adult stressors and dopamine synthesis capacity. These findings call into question the hypothesis that cannabis increases the risk of psychosis by inducing the same changes observed in schizophrenia, although there some evidence to support the hypothesis that psychosocial stressors do increase risk via this mechanism.Open Acces

Professional status matters: Differences in flow proneness between professional and amateur contemporary musicians

Achieving peak performance for musicians often requires getting into a state of flow. Experiencing this state depends on various genetic and environmental factors; however, the importance of one’s professional status in relation to flow remains unexplored. Therefore, we investigated the differences in flow proneness between professional and amateur musicians in a large sample (N = 664) of contemporary musicians. We found that professional musicians were significantly more flow prone in music than their amateur counterparts, and artists were significantly more flow prone than record producers. Further, professional musicians were more flow prone in their daily lives, suggesting a potential crossover effect of pursuing a flow-inducing activity to a professional level. Instrument, genre, and type of training did not influence flow proneness, and finally, trait anxiety was not significantly higher in professional musicians. Overall, this study highlights the positive consequences of pursuing music professionally and provides insight into the nuances of music professions that may influence flow proneness

Go with the flow: a neuroscientific view on being fully engaged

Flow is a state of full task absorption, accompanied with a strong drive and low levels of self-referential thinking. Flow is likely when there is a match between a person's skills and the task challenge. Despite its relevance for human performance and the vast body of research on flow, there is currently still relatively little insight in its underlying neurocognitive mechanisms. In this paper, we discuss a set of large brain networks that may be involved in establishing the core dimensions of flow. We propose that dopaminergic and noradrenergic systems mediate the intrinsic motivation and activate mood states that are typical for flow. The interaction between three large-scale attentional networks, namely the Default Mode Network, Central Executive Network and the Salience Network is proposed to play a role in the strong task engagement, low self-referential thinking, feedback and feelings of control in flow. The proposed relationships between flow and the brain networks may support the generation of new hypotheses and can guide future research in this field.Pathways through Adolescenc

Go with the flow: A neuroscientific view on being fully engaged

Flow is a state of full task absorption, accompanied with a strong drive and low levels of self-referential thinking. Flow is likely when there is a match between a person's skills and the task challenge. Despite its relevance for human performance and the vast body of researc

Dopaminergic Medication Decreases Motor Impulsivity on the Go/No-go Task in Parkinson\u27s Disease

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is characterized by resting tremor, rigidity, and bradykinesia. Dopaminergic medications treat motor symptoms, but have complex effects on cognition, including impulse control. Impulsivity is multifaceted in nature. Motor impulsivity involves inability to withhold prepotent, automatic responses whereas cognitive impulsivity refers to increased risk-taking and reward-seeking. We anticipated that dopaminergic therapy would decrease motor impulsivity. We employed the Go/No-go paradigm to assess motor impulsivity. PD patients were tested on and off their dopaminergic medication. PD patients on medication had a significantly higher proportion of Go Timeouts (i.e., Go responses not completed by the 750 millisecond deadline) compared to off medication (p=0.01). We interpret that dopaminergic therapy induces more conservative responding (i.e., decreased motor impulsivity) in PD patients. This contrasts with the widely-recognized notion of dopaminergic therapy increasing cognitive impulsivity and risk of impulse control disorders. Understanding the nuanced effects of dopaminergic treatment in PD will inform clinical decisions