Background
Serotonergic dysfunction has been associated with affective disorders. High trait
neuroticism, as measured on personality inventories, is a risk factor for major depression.
In this study we investigated whether neuroticism is associated with serotonin 2A
receptor binding in brain regions of relevance for affective disorders.
Methods
Eighty-three healthy volunteers completed the standardized personality questionnaire
NEO-PI-R (Revised NEO Personality Inventory) and underwent [18F]altanserin positron emission tomography imaging for assessment of serotonin 2A receptor
binding. The correlation between the neuroticism score and frontolimbic serotonin
2A receptor binding was evaluated by multiple linear regression analysis with adjustment
for age and gender.
Results
Neuroticism correlated positively with frontolimbic serotonin 2A receptor binding
[r(79) = .24, p = .028]. Post hoc analysis of the contributions from the six constituent traits of
neuroticism showed that the correlation was primarily driven by two of them: vulnerability
and anxiety. Indeed, vulnerability, defined as a person’s difficulties in coping with
stress, displayed the strongest positive correlation, which remained significant after
correction for multiple comparisons (r = .35, p = .009).
Conclusions
In healthy subjects the personality dimension neuroticism and particularly its constituent
trait, vulnerability, are positively associated with frontolimbic serotonin 2A binding.
Our findings point to a neurobiological link between personality risk factors for
affective disorder and the serotonergic transmitter system and identify the serotonin
2A receptor as a biomarker for vulnerability to affective disorder.
Key Words
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: September 20, 2007
Accepted:
July 5,
2007
Received in revised form:
July 4,
2007
Received:
April 12,
2007
Identification
Copyright
© 2008 Society of Biological Psychiatry. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
