Table 1_A free association semantic task for fNIRS-based perinatal depression assessment.docx

Perinatal depression (PD) is a highly prevalent psychological disorder that has a detrimental effect on infant and maternal physical and mental health, but effective and objective assessment of PD is still insufficient. In recent years, the functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) has been acknowledged as an effective non-invasive tool for clinical assessment of depression. This study proposed a free association semantic task (FAST) paradigm for fNIRS-based assessment of PD. To better address the emotion characteristics of PD, the participants are required to generate a dynamic concept chain based on positive, negative or neutral seed words, while 48-channel fNIRS recordings over frontal and bilateral temporal regions. Results from twenty-two late-pregnant women revealed that, the oxyhemoglobin (oxy-Hb) changes during the FAST with the positive and negative seed words over the frontal region were correlated with PD severity, which was different from the correlation patterns in the FAST with neutral seed word and the classical verbal fluency test (VFT). Furthermore, distinct correlation patterns were also observed in the FAST with the positive and negative seed words, manifested in fNIRS channels corresponding to the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and right inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), respectively. Moreover, regression analyses showed that the FAST with positive and negative seed words can well explain the severity of PD. Our findings suggest the proposed FAST paradigm as a promising approach for PD assessment.

围产期抑郁症（Perinatal Depression, PD）是一种高患病率的精神障碍，对母婴的身心健康均会造成不良影响，但目前针对PD的有效且客观评估手段仍较为匮乏。近年来，功能性近红外光谱技术（functional near-infrared spectroscopy, fNIRS）已被证实是一种用于抑郁症临床评估的有效非侵入式工具。本研究提出了一种基于fNIRS的PD评估范式——自由联想语义任务（free association semantic task, FAST）。为更好地贴合PD患者的情绪特征，要求受试者基于正性、负性或中性启动词生成动态概念链，同时采集额区及双侧颞区共48通道的fNIRS信号。对22名晚期妊娠女性的分析结果显示，在使用正性、负性启动词的FAST任务中，额区的氧合血红蛋白（oxyhemoglobin, oxy-Hb）变化与PD严重程度呈显著相关，这一关联模式与使用中性启动词的FAST任务及经典言语流畅性测验（verbal fluency test, VFT）所得结果存在显著差异。此外，正性、负性启动词对应的FAST任务也呈现出不同的关联模式，分别对应右侧背外侧前额叶皮层（right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, DLPFC）与右侧额下回（right inferior frontal gyrus, IFG）的fNIRS通道。进一步的回归分析表明，采用正性、负性启动词的FAST任务可较好地解释PD严重程度。本研究结果提示，所提出的FAST范式有望成为PD评估的有效手段。