The Anatomy of the Mesolimbic Reward System: A Link between Personality and the Placebo Analgesic Response

• DOI: 10.1523/jneurosci.5634-08.2009
• Publication Date: 2009-04-15T17:38:43Z
• Authors: Petra Schweinhardt; David A. Seminowicz; Erik Jaeger; Gary H. Duncan; M. Catherine Bush...
• Keywords: Ventral striatum; Reward system; Anticipation (artificial intelligence)

The anticipation of clinical benefit, a crucial component placebo analgesia, has been suggested to be special case reward anticipation. Since processing is closely linked the ventral striatum and neurotransmitter dopamine, we examined relationships between brain gray matter, analgesic response, personality traits associated with dopaminergic neurotransmission. We report that dopamine-related predict substantial portion pain relief an individual gains from sham treatment. Voxel-based morphometry magnetic resonance images shows magnitude analgesia related matter density (GMD) in several regions, including striatum, insula, prefrontal cortex. Similarly, GMD cortex traits. Our findings highlight relationship potentially offer ways identifying subjects who are likely show large responses.