INVESTIGADORES
ALBA FERRARA lucia M
congresos y reuniones científicas
Título:
Correlatos neurales del procesamiento de la prosodia emocional en población sana y clínica
Autor/es:
ALBA FERRARA, L.
Lugar:
Buenos Aires
Reunión:
Congreso; XII Congreso Argentino de Neuropsiquiatria y Neurociencia Cognitiva; 2010
Institución organizadora:
Asociación Neuropsiquiatrica Argentina
Resumen:
The tone of voice, known as prosody, conveys information about the emotional state and intention of others, which is necessary to ensure effective communication. Deficits in this capacity have a direct negative impact in social functioning. The neural correlates of prosody are not totally understood and controversial finding have aroused due in part to the different techniques applied to reveal them. In a first study, we assessed the neural representation of emotional prosody processing in non-clinical population with fMRI. Using the peak activations found in the fMRI study, we defined regions of interest (ROIs) in which we applied transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). TMS was applied over two regions of interest, left and right superior temporal gyrus (STG), using a protocol known to depress neural activity on the ipsilateral ROI. TMS on the right STG obstructed prosody decoding, thus this region has a causal contribution to the task. However when TMS was applied on the left STG, the task was facilitated. Given that the left hemisphere is not related to prosodic processing, TMS over the left STG could lead to desinhibition of the contralateral through the suppression of transcallosal inhibition enhancing right hemisphere functions. In a second study, we have assessed prosody deficits in schizophrenia. Potential therapeutic effects of TMS in the treatment of prosody deficits in schizophrenia will be discussed.