Abstract #3286

Kushnir T, Hermesh H, Gross-Isseroff R, Weizman A, Marom S, Manor D

Social anxiety disorder (SAD) is a very common psychiatric condition. However, the dysfunctional neural network remains to be elucidated. There are indications that cortical and subcortical regions related to the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) underlie some of the manifestations of this disorder. This study challenges the OFC by using a learning paradigm, alternation learning, which is specifically subserved by this region in both human and subhuman species. fMRI study during performance of this paradigm by SAD patients, showed frontal activation encompassing the fronotemporal, including the OFC and intraparietal cortex, and demonstrated relationship between symptom severity and the pattern of activation.