Hossein Khatibi, “Characterizing the Relationship Between Self-Reported Trauma and Neural Indices of Cognitive Inhibition”
Mentor: Han Joo Lee, Psychology, Letters & Science (College of)
Poster #92
Individuals who have experienced trauma can harbor intrusive thoughts, experience emotional numbness/distress, and even live in a constant state of fear. The concept of trauma has existed for centuries. Ancient times explained these people as “affected”, World War I referred to it as “shell shock”, and contemporarily, it is known as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), yet the underlying neurocognitive construct of trauma has yet to be fully characterized. Characterizing the underlying neurocognitive indices in trauma is critical to establishing new treatments and improving existing treatments. Thus, the purpose of the current research is to characterize the relationship between self-reported trauma severity and neural indices of cognitive inhibition. The Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Checklist for DSM-5 (PCL-5), a self-report questionnaire, will be used to examine trauma severity on a dimensional scale. In addition, a computerized experimental task will be administered to measure cognitive inhibition whilst brain activity is recorded using electroencephalography (EEG). It is anticipated that those with greater trauma severity will exhibit overactive brain indices as a compensatory mechanism to maintain behavioral performance resulting in inefficient and excessive cognitive inhibition. The overall goal of this study is to characterize the neural markers of PTSD which may contribute to improving existing treatments and establishing new treatments. Key words from the study that would require definitions include EEG, cognitive inhibition, PTSD, and the PCL-5.