Alterations of gray matter asymmetry in internet gaming disorder

Structural asymmetry is a subtle but pervasive property of the human brain, which has been found altered in various psychiatric and neurocognitive disorders. However, little is known regarding potential alterations of structural asymmetry underlying internet gaming disorder (IGD). Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the structural features of gray matter asymmetry in IGD. High-resolution structural magnetic resonance imaging data were collected from 104 individuals with IGD and 104 recreational game users (RGUs). We applied a whole-brain voxel-based asymmetry (VBA) approach to determine the asymmetrical aberrations of gray matter in relation to IGD. Furthermore, the local abnormalities of structural asymmetry were employed as features to examine the effect of classification using a support vector machine (SVM). The results indicated that individuals with IGD as compared to RGUs showed asymmetrical alterations of gray matter in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC), orbitofrontal cortex, precuneus, middle temporal gyrus, superior parietal lobule and inferior temporal gyrus, regions implicated in hedonic motivation, self-reflection, information integration and visuospatial attention processing. Moreover, these atypical asymmetrical features can distinguish IGD subjects from RGUs with high accuracy. These results suggested that disrupted structural asymmetry of motivational reward, visuospatial and default mode circuits might be potential biomarkers for identifying pathological gaming dependence. These findings extended our understanding of structural underpinnings of IGD and provided new insights for developing effective interventions to alleviate compulsive gaming usage.