Anterior cingulate serotonin 1B receptor binding is associated with emotional response inhibition

Abstract

Serotonin has a well-established role in emotional processing and is a key neurotransmitter in impulsive aggression, presumably by facilitating response inhibition and regulating subcortical reactivity to aversive stimuli. In this study 44 men, of whom 19 were violent offenders and 25 were non-offender controls, completed an emotional Go/NoGo task requiring inhibition of prepotent motor responses to emotional facial expressions. We also measured cerebral serotonin 1B receptor (5-HT_1BR) binding with [¹¹C]AZ10419369 positron emission tomography within regions of the frontal cortex. We hypothesized that 5-HT_1BR would be positively associated with false alarms (failures to inhibit nogo responses) in the context of aversive (angry and fearful) facial expressions. Across groups, we found that frontal cortex 5-HT_1BR binding was positively correlated with false alarms when angry faces were go stimuli and neutral faces were nogo stimuli (p = 0.05, corrected alpha = 0.0125), but not with false alarms for non-emotional stimuli (failures to inhibit geometric figures). A posthoc analysis revealed the strongest association in anterior cingulate cortex (p = 0.006). In summary, 5-HT_1BRs in the anterior cingulate are involved in withholding a prepotent response in the context of angry faces. Our findings suggest that serotonin modulates response inhibition in the context of certain emotional stimuli.

Keywords: Aggression; Go/NoGo; Impulsivity; PET; Positron emission tomography; Violent offenders.