Pupillary motility responses to affectively salient stimuli in individuals with depression or elevated risk of depression: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Xi Yang; Andrew J Fridman; Nash Unsworth; Melynda D Casement

doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2023.105125

Pupillary motility responses to affectively salient stimuli in individuals with depression or elevated risk of depression: A systematic review and meta-analysis

Neurosci Biobehav Rev. 2023 May:148:105125. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2023.105125. Epub 2023 Mar 15.

Authors

Xi Yang¹, Andrew J Fridman², Nash Unsworth³, Melynda D Casement⁴

Affiliations

¹ Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, 1451 Onyx St, Eugene, OR US 97403, USA. Electronic address: xiy@uoregon.edu.
² Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, 1451 Onyx St, Eugene, OR US 97403, USA. Electronic address: afridman@uoregon.edu.
³ Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, 1451 Onyx St, Eugene, OR US 97403, USA. Electronic address: nashu@uoregon.edu.
⁴ Department of Psychology, University of Oregon, 1451 Onyx St, Eugene, OR US 97403, USA. Electronic address: casement@uoregon.edu.

PMID: 36924842
DOI: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2023.105125

Abstract

Elaborative affective processing is observed in depression, and pupillary reactivity, a continuous, sensitive, and reliable indicator of physiological arousal and neurocognitive processing, is increasingly utilized in studies of depression-related characteristics. As a first attempt to quantitively summarize existing evidence on depression-related pupillary reactivity alterations, this review and meta-analysis evaluated the direction, magnitude, and specificity of pupillary indices of affective processing towards positively, negatively, and neutrally-valenced stimuli among individuals diagnosed with depression or with elevated risk of depression. Studies on pupillary responses to affective stimuli in the target groups were identified in PsycINFO and PubMed databases. Twenty-two articles met inclusion criteria for the qualitative review and 16 for the quantitative review. Three-level frequentist and Bayesian models were applied to summarize pooled effects from baseline-controlled stimuli-induced average changes in pupillary responses. In general, compared to non-depressed individuals, individuals with depression or elevated risk of depression exhibited higher pupillary reactivity (d =0.15) towards negatively-valenced stimuli during affective processing. Pupillary motility towards negatively-valenced stimuli may be a promising trait-like marker for depression vulnerability.

Keywords: Affective processing; Depression; Meta-analysis; Pupillometry; Systematic review.

Publication types

Meta-Analysis
Systematic Review
Review

MeSH terms

Bayes Theorem
Depression* / diagnosis
Humans