健康与遗传心理学研究室知识库

物质成瘾依赖者存在着情绪加工障碍，主要表现为情绪调节障碍与情绪唤醒体验异常。甲基苯丙胺成瘾者前额叶对杏仁核自上而下的调节功能受损，这使得甲基苯丙胺成瘾者容易对情绪刺激出现过度的体验和反应性。在临床观察中发现甲基苯丙胺成瘾人群有易怒、冲动攻击性的情绪反应特征；流行病学的调查也发现甲基苯丙胺成瘾者在药物使用及戒断后都有较强的暴力攻击性，因此甲基苯丙胺成瘾者情绪加工障碍的主要体现可能是其愤怒攻击性。以往对愤怒攻击性的干预存在着药物手段、神经调控技术、认知行为治疗等方法，虽然存在一定的效果，但在不同层面上存在着局限性。视觉（颜色）和听觉（音乐）刺激可作用于皮层及皮层下情绪加工相关的脑区，通过改善皮层至皮层下这一调控环路来增强对愤怒情绪的控制能力。虚拟现实技术具有整合视听等基本感觉的优势，在整合过程中实现对情绪调控的目标。因此，对甲基苯丙胺成瘾者愤怒情绪的探索及虚拟现实环境下视听感觉联合干预其愤怒攻击性，可为甲基苯丙胺成瘾者愤怒情绪的临床干预方法和技术的研究提供新的思路和技术平台。
针对甲基苯丙胺成瘾者对基本情绪体验反应特征的研究，实验一采用情绪视频，结合皮电、惊反射等客观生理指标，探索60 名甲基苯丙胺成瘾者对愉悦、愤怒等正负性情绪的体验和生理反应，确定愤怒情绪是甲基苯丙胺成瘾者的主要情绪障碍。实验二、三在实验一问题靶点确定的基础上，综合行为、皮电、心电、脑电等生理指标，在虚拟现实环境中利用修订的泰勒攻击范式（Modified TaylorAggressive Paradigm,MTAP）任务激发124 名甲基苯丙胺成瘾者的愤怒情绪，并对激发的愤怒攻击性进行跨感觉通道刺激的干预和预防两个方面的实验研究。
研究发现：（1）甲基苯丙胺成瘾者对愤怒情绪有显著增强的惊反射肌电值、皮电唤醒水平和主观唤醒体验；（2）甲基苯丙胺成瘾者在虚拟现实环境中借助经典的攻击范式激发出高愤怒攻击行为（惩罚等级）和攻击倾向性（偏右侧化的额叶a 波）；（3）颜色+音乐组合干预可降低伴随甲基苯丙胺成瘾者愤怒攻击性的皮电、心率等生理唤醒水平；（4）提前改变激发愤怒攻击性的环境，发现颜色+音乐的视听环境可预防甲基苯丙胺成瘾者愤怒攻击行为（惩罚等级）的上升，降低攻击倾向性（偏左侧化的额叶a 波），抑制伴随愤怒攻击性的皮电、心率等生理反应指标的升高。
这些结果提示，愤怒情绪应是甲基苯丙胺成瘾人群重点关注的负性情绪；甲基苯丙胺成瘾者在虚拟现实环境中借助经典的攻击范式可激发出其愤怒攻击性；虚拟现实技术+视听双感觉通道可对甲基苯丙胺成瘾者的愤怒情绪具有干预和预防两方面的效果，开创了对愤怒情绪及攻击行为的新的临床干预方法。

People with substance addiction manifest emotional disorders including abnormal emotional regulation and experience. Methamphetamine causes damage on the neural circuit between the prefrontal lobe and amygdala that makes methamphetamine addicts prone to have excessive experience and responsiveness to emotional stimuli. Clinical observation found that the methamphetamine addicts are characterized with irritability and impulsive aggression. Epidemiological studies also found that methamphetamine addicts are highly aggressive after taking drugs as well as in withdrawal period. Therefore, anger and aggression may be the main manifestation of emotional disorder in methamphetamine addicts. The existing intervention methods such as pharmacotherapy, neural regulation, and cognitive behavioral therapy have shown a certain effects. However, the limitations of these methods urge for more effective treatment in this field. Visual (color) and auditory (musical) stimuli can influence cortical and subcortical brain regions that associated with emotional processing. Therefore they can enhance addicts’ ability to control anger through improving the function connectivity of the neural circuit for cognitive control between cortical and subcortical. The virtual reality technology has the advantages of integrating audio, visual, and other senses, and to achieve the goal of emotional control during integration process. Thus, the exploration of anger and the combination of visual and auditory stimuli in virtual reality environment can lead to the reduction of anger aggression in methamphetamine addicts. It will provide new ideas and technical platform for clinical studies for the anger of methamphetamine addicts.
Aimed to investigate the characteristics of the response to basic emotional stimuli in methamphetamine addicts, in the first experiment, the researcher used emotional videos as stimuli, as well as the measurement of skin electricity startle reflex and other objective physiological indicators to explore the emotional experience and physiological response of sixty methamphetamine addicts to positive and negative emotional stimuli (e.g., pleasure, anger). The result was in line with the previous studies that anger is the major emotional disorder in methamphetamine addicts. Based on the problem (i.e., anger) targeted by the experiment one, in the experiments of two and three, the researcher utilized behavior, skin conductance level, ECG, EEG, and other physiological indicators as measurements, and used the Modified Taylor Aggressive Paradigm (MTAP) task in the virtual reality to stimulate the anger of one hundred and twenty-four methamphetamine addicts. Then, the researcher used visual and audio stimuli as cross-sensory stimulation to intervene and prevent the anger aggression of methamphetamine addicts.
The results showed that: (1) the levels of EMG, skin electrical arousal andsubjective rating of arousal experience were significantly increased in methamphetamine addicts; (2) in the virtual reality environment, MTAP stimulated the high aggressive behavior (punishment level) and aggressive tendency (partial right frontal alpha band) in methamphetamine addicts; (3) the cross-sensory intervention combined with color and music reduced the physiological arousal levels of skin conductance and heart rate associated with the anger in methamphetamine addicts; (4) by changing the environment before implementing the anger aggression stimulation, color and music intervention effectively prevented the anger aggressive behavior (punishment level) of methamphetamine addicts to rise, and reduced the aggressive tendency (partial left frontal alpha band), inhibited the increase of the physiological arousal levels of skin conductance and heart rate associated with anger in methamphetamine addicts.
These results suggest that anger is an important negative emotion in methamphetamine addicts which needs more attention. In virtual reality environment, MTAP can stimulate the anger aggression in methamphetamine addicts. Virtual reality technology combined with audio-visual dual sensory channels stimulation can effectively intervene and prevent the anger of methamphetamine addicts. This new method creates a new clinical intervention for treating anger and aggressive behavior.