(Press-News.org) CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Patients with persistent ringing in the ears – a condition known as tinnitus – process emotions differently in the brain from those with normal hearing, researchers report in the journal Brain Research.
Tinnitus afflicts 50 million people in the United States, according to the American Tinnitus Association, and causes those with the condition to hear noises that aren't really there. These phantom sounds are not speech, but rather whooshing noises, train whistles, cricket noises or whines. Their severity often varies day to day.
University of Illinois speech and hearing science professor Fatima Husain, who led the study, said previous studies showed that tinnitus is associated with increased stress, anxiety, irritability and depression, all of which are affiliated with the brain's emotional processing systems.
"Obviously, when you hear annoying noises constantly that you can't control, it may affect your emotional processing systems," Husain said. "But when I looked at experimental work done on tinnitus and emotional processing, especially brain imaging work, there hadn't been much research published."
She decided to use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) brain scans to better understand how tinnitus affects the brain's ability to process emotions. These scans show the areas of the brain that are active in response to stimulation, based upon blood flow to those areas.
Three groups of participants were used in the study: people with mild-to-moderate hearing loss and mild tinnitus; people with mild-to-moderate hearing loss without tinnitus; and a control group of age-matched people without hearing loss or tinnitus. Each person was put in an fMRI machine and listened to a standardized set of 30 pleasant, 30 unpleasant and 30 emotionally neutral sounds (for example, a baby laughing, a woman screaming and a water bottle opening). The participants pressed a button to categorize each sound as pleasant, unpleasant or neutral.
The tinnitus and normal-hearing groups responded more quickly to emotion-inducing sounds than to neutral sounds, while patients with hearing loss had a similar response time to each category of sound. Over all, the tinnitus group's reaction times were slower than the reaction times of those with normal hearing.
Activity in the amygdala, a brain region associated with emotional processing, was lower in the tinnitus and hearing-loss patients than in people with normal hearing. Tinnitus patients also showed more activity than normal-hearing people in two other brain regions associated with emotion, the parahippocampus and the insula. The findings surprised Husain.
"We thought that because people with tinnitus constantly hear a bothersome, unpleasant stimulus, they would have an even higher amount of activity in the amygdala when hearing these sounds, but it was lesser," she said. "Because they've had to adjust to the sound, some plasticity in the brain has occurred. They have had to reduce this amygdala activity and reroute it to other parts of the brain because the amygdala cannot be active all the time due to this annoying sound."
Because of the sheer number of people who suffer from tinnitus in the United States, a group that includes many combat veterans, Husain hopes her group's future research will be able to increase tinnitus patients' quality of life.
"It's a communication issue and a quality-of-life issue," she said. "We want to know how we can get better in the clinical realm. Audiologists and clinicians are aware that tinnitus affects emotional aspects, too, and we want to make them aware that these effects are occurring so they can better help their patients."
INFORMATION:
To reach Fatima Husain, call 217-333-2230; email husainf@illinois.edu.
The paper, "Alterations of the emotional processing system may underlie preserved rapid reaction time in tinnitus," is available online or from the University of Illinois News Bureau.
LINK to professor's web page: http://www.acnlab.com/
LINK to department: http://shs.illinois.edu/
LINK to paper: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006899314005228
People with tinnitus process emotions differently from their peers, researchers report
2014-06-25
[Attachments] See images for this press release:
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
New math technique improves atomic property predictions to historic accuracy
2014-06-25
By combining advanced mathematics with high-performance computing, scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and Indiana University (IU) have developed a tool that allowed them to calculate a fundamental property of most atoms on the periodic table to historic accuracy—reducing error by a factor of a thousand in many cases. The technique also could be used to determine a host of other atomic properties important in fields like nuclear medicine and astrophysics.*
NIST's James Sims and IU's Stanley Hagstrom have calculated the base energy levels ...
Study: Motivational interviewing helps reduce home secondhand smoke exposure
2014-06-25
A Johns Hopkins-led research team has found that motivational interviewing, along with standard education and awareness programs, significantly reduced secondhand smoke exposure among children living in those households.
Motivational interviewing, a counseling strategy that gained popularity in the treatment of alcoholics, uses a patient-centered counseling approach to help motivate people to change behaviors. Experts say it stands in contrast to externally driven tactics, instead favoring to work with patients by acknowledging how difficult change is and by helping people ...
MicroRNA that blocks bone destruction could offer new therapeutic target for osteoporosis
2014-06-25
DALLAS – June 25, 2014 – UT Southwestern cancer researchers have identified a promising molecule that blocks bone destruction and, therefore, could provide a potential therapeutic target for osteoporosis and bone metastases of cancer.
The molecule, miR-34a, belongs to a family of small molecules called microRNAs (miRNAs) that serve as brakes to help regulate how much of a protein is made, which in turn, determines how cells respond.
UT Southwestern researchers found that mice with higher than normal levels of miR-34a had increased bone mass and reduced bone breakdown. ...
First positive results toward a therapeutic vaccine against brain cancer
2014-06-25
Astrocytomas and oligodendrogliomas are subtypes of a brain cancer called 'glioma'. These incurable brain tumors arise from glial cells, a type of support cell found in the central nervous system. "Low-grade gliomas", which grow comparatively slowly, spread in a diffuse manner across the brain and are very difficult to completely eliminate through surgery. In many cases, the effectiveness of treatments with chemotherapy and radiotherapy is very limited. Gliomas can develop into extremely aggressive glioblastomas.
Low-grade gliomas have a particular feature in common: ...
Natural resources worth more than US$40 trillion must be accounted for
2014-06-25
Natural resources worth more than US$40 Trillion must be accounted for
Governments and companies must do more to account for their impact and dependence on the natural environment - according to researchers at the University of East Anglia.
New research published today in the journal Nature Climate Change reveals that although some companies like Puma and Gucci are leading the way, more needs to be done to foster a sustainable green economy.
Researchers say that while the economic value of lost natural resources can be difficult to quantify, much more must be done ...
Kaiser Permanente paper: E-surveillance program targets care gaps in outpatient settings
2014-06-25
PASADENA, Calif., June 25, 2014 — An innovative framework for identifying and addressing potential gaps in health care in outpatient settings using electronic clinical surveillance tools has been used to target patient safety across a variety of conditions, according to a study published today in the journal eGEMs.
The Kaiser Permanente Southern California Outpatient Safety Net Program (OSNP) leverages the power of electronic health records as well as a proactive clinical culture to scan for potential quality improvement opportunities and intervene to improve patient ...
Obesity before pregnancy linked to earliest preterm births, Stanford/Packard study finds
2014-06-25
Women who are obese before they become pregnant face an increased risk of delivering a very premature baby, according to a new study of nearly 1 million California births.
The findings from the Stanford University School of Medicine provide important clues as to what triggers extremely preterm births, specifically those that occur prior to 28 weeks of pregnancy.
The study, published in the July issue of Paediatric and Perinatal Epidemiology, found no link between maternal obesity and premature births that happen between 28 and 37 weeks of the normal 40-week gestation ...
Earlier snowmelt prompting earlier breeding of Arctic birds
2014-06-25
A new collaborative study that included the work of Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) biologists has revealed that migratory birds that breed in Arctic Alaska are initiating nests earlier in the spring, and that snowmelt occurring earlier in the season is a big reason why.
The report, "Phenological advancement in arctic bird species: relative importance of snow melt and ecological factors," appears in the current on-line edition of the journal Polar Biology. Lead author Joe Liebezeit (formerly with WCS) and co-author Steve Zack of WCS have conducted research on Arctic ...
UMN research uncovers structure, protein elements critical to human function and disease
2014-06-25
MINNEAPOLIS/ST. PAUL (June 23, 2014) – New structures discovered within cilia show a relationship between certain proteins and juvenile myoclonic epilepsy. The discovery, made at the University of Minnesota, was named paper of the week in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, and sheds new light on the microstructure of cilia.
Cilia are microscopic, hair-like structures occurring in large numbers on the surface of some of the body's cells and are involved in movement and perception. Cilia are composed of double microtubules, which are in turn composed of protofilaments.
Richard ...
Chronic brain damage not as prevalent in NFL players, say researchers
2014-06-25
ROSEMONT, IL – A study published online today in Sports Health: A Multidisciplinary Approach provides a different take on previous information regarding the prevalence of chronic brain damage in retired NFL players.
Researchers performed in-depth neurological examinations of 45 retired NFL players, ranging in age from 30-to 60-years old. The analysis included state-of-the-art magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), susceptibility weighted imaging (SWI), diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) along with comprehensive neuropsychological and neurological examinations, interviews, blood ...