[Disorders of attention to emotional stimuli in recurrent depression: data from an oculographic study]

To study the features of oculomotor reactions when presenting emotionally charged stimuli in patients with a non-psychotic depressive episode as part of a recurrent depressive disorder (RDD).

The one-stage cross-sectional non-randomized clinical and psychophysiological study included 46 patients with verified DDR and 40 patients without mental disorders (control group, CG). All DDR patients underwent inpatient treatment for a current non-psychotic depressive episode (ICD-10 code: F33.0-F33.2).

The clinical examination included a diagnostic interview using the M.I.N.I. questionnaire and the original clinical and psychopathological chart, the Montgomery-Asberg Depression Rating Scale (MADRS), the Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HARS), the Young Mania Rating Scale (YMRS), the Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF), and the HCL-32 Hypomania Checklist. Participants in the control group were screened using the M.I.N.I. questionnaire.

An oculographic study of participants was conducted using an eye tracker with a frequency resolution of 300 Hz. The study protocol included the presentation of 80 paired images of male and female faces, neutral and emotionally charged (anger, disgust, fright, joy, and sadness). The images were taken from an open, validated WSEFEPB database.

In the DDR group, a decrease in the total fixation time on joyful faces was observed, as well as a decrease in the number of fixations on any stimuli, along with an increase in the average duration of a single fixation, which was not found in the CG.

A direct relationship between the mean fixation time in the analysis of images of evil faces and the severity of depression, as measured by the MADRS score, was observed, as was an inverse relationship between the number of fixations on happy faces and the MADRS score. The number of fixations on neutral faces showed a direct relationship with disease duration and an inverse relationship with the MADRS score.

The area under the ROC curve (AUC) was 0.754, indicating satisfactory diagnostic model performance. The results of the ROC analysis showed the validity of oculographic indicators as diagnostic psychophysiological markers.

Oculographic study makes it possible to diagnose recurrent depressive disorder with satisfactory accuracy.