An fMRI study of reduced left prefrontal activation in schizophrenia during normal inhibitory function

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to investigate the hypothesis that schizophrenia is associated with a dysfunction of prefrontal brain regions during motor response inhibition. Generic brain activation of six male medicated patients with schizophrenia was compared to that of seven healthy comparison subjects matched for sex, age, and education level while performing 'stop' and 'go-no-go' tasks. No group differences were observed in task performance. Patients, however, showed reduced BOLD signal response in left anterior cingulate during both inhibition tasks and reduced left rostral dorsolateral prefrontal and increased thalamus and putamen BOLD signal response during stop task performance. Despite good task performance, patients with schizophrenia thus showed abnormal neural network patterns of reduced left prefrontal activation and increased subcortical activation when challenged with motor response inhibition.