Effects of acute transcranial direct current stimulation in hot and cold working memory tasks in healthy and depressed subjects
Open accessAbstract
Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) hypoactivity and subcortical hyperactivity have been associated to cognitive impairment for non-emotional ("cold") and emotional ("hot") working memory tasks in major depressive disorder (MDD). We investigated whether an increase of DLPFC activity using transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) would differently influence the performance in working memory tasks in depressed and healthy subjects. Forty young adult participants (20 with MDD and 20 healthy controls) were randomized to a single, sham-controlled, bifrontal (left anodal/right cathodal), 2mA, 30min tDCS session in a parallel design. The n-back and the internal shift task (IST) were used as proxies of cold and hot working memory performance, respectively. Active tDCS compared to sham promoted more accurate and faster responses to the n-back task for both patients and controls. Conversely, only patients presented an improvement in response times for the IST task. Our findings suggest that the mechanisms of tDCS in MDD involve modulation of both cold and hot working memory. We discuss these findings considering the modulatory top-down effects of tDCS on subcortical structures via prefrontal activation, and how spreading of activation might be different for healthy volunteers versus depressed patients. We also discuss the role of tDCS in cognitive amelioration for depressed patients. Finally, the distinct effects of tDCS in the "hot" cognition task for healthy and depressed participants are indicative that tDCS outcomes are also regulated by differences in baseline activity of the stimulated network.
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Moreno et al. (2015) and Biundo et al. (2015) used the RBANS written coding task.
“Diverging from other included studies, both Moreno et al. (2015) (Z-score >1.96) and Biundo et al. (2015) (Z-score >1.96) used the RBANS written coding task.”
From Efficacy of non-invasive brain stimulation on cognitive functioning in brain disorders: a meta-analysis (2020) · cites this paper as Moreno et al. (2015)
Section 2.3 (Procedures; page unavailable) identifies the tasks used by Moreno et al. as the 2-back and Internal Shift Task, not the RBANS written coding task. Section 2.5 (Statistical analysis; page unavailable) likewise describes analyses of those two tasks; it does not report the claimed Z-score threshold. This verdict concerns Moreno et al. only, not Biundo et al. (LLM, conf=0.87)
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Cites
N-back working memory paradigm: a meta-analysis of normative functional neuroimaging studies.
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Hot and cold cognition in depression
Roiser, J. P., & Sahakian, B. J. (2013) · CNS Spectrums · doi:10.1017/s1092852913000072 · Cited by 354 · see citing works
Amelioration of Cognitive Control in Depression by Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation
Wolkenstein, L., & Plewnia, C. (2013) · Biological Psychiatry · doi:10.1016/j.biopsych.2012.10.010 · Cited by 213 · see citing works
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Research works printed but not linked: 6
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- A.R. Brunoni, T.A. Zanao, M.A. Vanderhasselt, L. Valiengo, J.F. de Oliveira, P.S. Boggio, P.A. Lotufo, I.M. Bensenor, F. Fregni, Enhancement of Affective Processing Induced by Bifrontal Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation in Patients With Major Depression, Neuromodulation : journal of the International Neuromodulation Society (2013) [Epub ahead of print].
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Begemann, M. J., Brand, B. A., Ćurčić-Blake, B., Aleman, A., & Sommer, I. E. (2020) · Psychological Medicine · doi:10.1017/s0033291720003670 · Cited by 368 · see citing works
Nikolin, S., Tan, Y. Y., Schwaab, A., Moffa, A., Loo, C. K., & Martin, D. (2021) · Journal of Affective Disorders · doi:10.1016/j.jad.2021.01.084 · Cited by 205 · see citing works
Self-citation
- Authors
- Moreno, M. L., Vanderhasselt, M.-A., Carvalho, A. F., Moffa, A. H., Lotufo, P. A., Benseñor, I. M., & Brunoni, A. R.
- Affiliations
- Universidade de São Paulo (BR)
- Ghent University (BE)
- Universidade Federal do Ceará (BR)
- ORCID
- Venue
- Neuroscience Letters
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2015-03
- Volume
- 591
- Pages
- 126-131
- ISSN
- 0304-3940 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2045686650
- Cited by
- 66
- References
- 4
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 1 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 4 · 2022: 6 · 2021: 10 · 2020: 9 · 2019: 10 · 2018: 5 · 2017: 6 · 2016: 6 · 2015: 1
- FWCI
- 3.21
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Neuroscience Letters (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Ghent University Academic Bibliography (Ghent University) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Funders
- National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression (YI 2013/20493)
- Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento CientÃfico e Tecnológico (2013/470904)
- Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (2012/20911-5)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Neurology › Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation Studies
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Pharmacology › Treatment of Major Depression
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Psychiatry and Mental health › Electroconvulsive Therapy Studies
- Keywords
- transcranial direct current stimulation, major depressive disorder, working memory, emotional working memory, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, n-back task, top-down modulation
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Adult, Cognition, Depressive Disorder, Major, Major Depressive Disorder, Double-Blind Method, Emotions, Face, Female, Humans, Male, Memory, Short-Term, Photic Stimulation, Visual Perception, Case-Control Studies, Prefrontal Cortex, Young Adult, Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation
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