Neural response during attentional control and emotion processing predicts improvement after cognitive behavioral therapy in generalized social anxiety disorder

摘要

BackgroundIndividuals with generalized social anxiety disorder (gSAD) exhibit attentional bias to salient stimuli, which is reduced in patients whose symptoms improve after treatment, indicating that mechanisms of bias mediate treatment success. Therefore, pre-treatment activity in regions implicated in attentional control over socio-emotional signals (e.g. anterior cingulate cortex, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex) may predict response to cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), evidence-based psychotherapy for gSAD.