The left middle temporal gyrus in the middle of an impaired social-affective communication network in social anxiety disorder.

BACKGROUND: Previous studies on patients diagnosed with social anxiety disorder (SAD) reported changed patterns of the resting-state functional connectivity network (rs-FCN) between the prefrontal cortices and other prefrontal, amygdalar or striatal regions. Using a graph theory approach, this study explored the modularity-based community profile and patterns of inter-/intra-modular communication for the rs-FCN in SAD.

METHODS: In total, for 28 SAD patients and 27 healthy controls (HC), functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data were acquired in resting-state and subjected to a graph theory analysis.

RESULTS: The within-module degree z-score for a hub region [out of a total of 10 hub regions ranked using the participation coefficient] named left middle temporal gyrus was impaired in SAD compared to HC, proportional to the severity of clinician-scored and patient-reported functional impairment in SAD.

LIMITATIONS: Most of participants included in this study were undergraduate students in their early-to-mid 20's.

CONCLUSIONS: This study showed the importance of functional communication from the left middle temporal gyrus with other opercular-insular-subcortical regions for better objective functioning and lesser subjective disability in SAD.