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Hypersensitivity to uncertainty is key feature of subjective cognitive impairment

View ORCID ProfileBahaaeddin Attaallah, View ORCID ProfilePierre Petitet, Elista Slavkova, Vicky Turner, Youssuf Saleh, Sanjay G. Manohar, Masud Husain
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.12.23.473986
Bahaaeddin Attaallah
1Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 9DU
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  • For correspondence: Bahaaeddin.Attaallah@ndcn.ox.ac.uk
Pierre Petitet
2Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3PH
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Elista Slavkova
2Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3PH
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Vicky Turner
1Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 9DU
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Youssuf Saleh
1Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 9DU
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Sanjay G. Manohar
1Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 9DU
2Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3PH
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Masud Husain
1Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 9DU
2Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3PH
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Abstract

With an increasingly ageing global population, more people are presenting with concerns about their cognitive function, but not all have an underlying neurodegenerative diagnosis. Subjective cognitive impairment (SCI) is a common condition describing self-reported deficits in cognition without objective evidence of cognitive impairment. Many individuals with SCI suffer from depression and anxiety, which have been hypothesised to account for their cognitive complaints. Despite this association between SCI and affective features, the cognitive and brain mechanisms underlying SCI are poorly understood. Here, we show that people with SCI are hypersensitive to uncertainty and that this might be a key mechanism accounting for their affective burden. Twenty-seven individuals with SCI performed an information sampling task, where they could actively gather information prior to decisions. Across different conditions, SCI participants sampled faster and obtained more information than matched controls to resolve uncertainty. Remarkably, despite their ‘urgent’ sampling behaviour, SCI participants were able to maintain their efficiency. Hypersensitivity to uncertainty indexed by this sampling behaviour correlated with the severity of affective burden including depression and anxiety. Analysis of MRI resting functional connectivity revealed that both uncertainty hypersensitivity and affective burden were associated with stronger insular-hippocampal connectivity. These results suggest that altered uncertainty processing is a key mechanism underlying the psycho-cognitive manifestations in SCI and implicate a specific brain network target for future treatment.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

Copyright 
The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.
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Posted December 24, 2021.
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Hypersensitivity to uncertainty is key feature of subjective cognitive impairment
Bahaaeddin Attaallah, Pierre Petitet, Elista Slavkova, Vicky Turner, Youssuf Saleh, Sanjay G. Manohar, Masud Husain
bioRxiv 2021.12.23.473986; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.12.23.473986
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Hypersensitivity to uncertainty is key feature of subjective cognitive impairment
Bahaaeddin Attaallah, Pierre Petitet, Elista Slavkova, Vicky Turner, Youssuf Saleh, Sanjay G. Manohar, Masud Husain
bioRxiv 2021.12.23.473986; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.12.23.473986

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