Variability in white matter structure relates to hallucination proneness

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Psychiatry
• Neuroimaging

Background:

• Hallucinations are common psychiatric symptoms, also occurring in healthy individuals.
• Persistent psychosis-like experiences in healthy people may predict future psychotic disorders.
• A psychosis continuum suggests shared brain variations across clinical and non-clinical populations.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate white matter structural differences associated with hallucination proneness (HP) in healthy individuals.
• To explore the relationship between HP and brain structure, bypassing clinical confounds.
• To identify specific white matter pathways implicated in psychosis risk within a healthy population.

Main Methods:

• Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) was used to assess white matter structure.
• Fifty healthy participants (35 female) were included in the study.
• Fractional anisotropy (FA) was analyzed in relation to HP in specific fiber tracts.

Main Results:

• Increased HP correlated with enhanced fractional anisotropy (FA) in key white matter tracts.
• Specifically, the right uncinate fasciculus, bilateral arcuate fasciculus, and corpus callosum showed significant alterations.
• These findings provide the first evidence of structural white matter variability linked to HP in healthy individuals.

Conclusions:

• The study supports a psychosis continuum model, detectable through brain structure in healthy individuals.
• Structural variations in targeted pathways may relate to salience and attention mechanisms.
• These findings highlight potential neurobiological markers for psychosis risk in the general population.