Less than a pretty face: Brain scans show how a disorder leads individuals to perceive themselves as ugly.

    Despite living in a culture obsessed with physical flawlessness, most people in the U.S. have a relatively realistic perception of their own form and face-blemishes, bulges and all. About one to two percent of the population, however, suffers from a recognized psychological illness, known as body dysmorphic disorder （or BDD）, which causes them to be preoccupied with physical defects that they think make them look repugnant. Such tendencies can lead some people to extreme and frequent plastic surgeries and even suicide.

    A new study used brain scans to see how patients' minds worked when looking at faces-both of others and themselves. The results, published online February 1 in Archives of General Psychiatry, show that people with BDD seem to get hung up on details and hint at a link with obsessive-compulsive disorder.

    The new case-control study used functional magnetic-resonance imaging （fMRI） to study brain activity among 33 people （17 control subjects and 16 with BDD） as the subjects looked at photos of their face and that of a familiar celebrity. Previous research and clinical observation had found that people with BDD tend to "focus primarily on details of their appearance at the expense of global or configural aspects," the researchers wrote.

    So following this lead, the researchers （led by Jamie Feusner, of the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles） showed subjects standard photos as well as altered versions: one in which only the details remained and another in which only basic, blurred information remained.

    Although the study was small, the researchers found a distinct difference between how the brains of the people with BDD and the control individuals reacted upon seeing the images. Analysis of the scans showed that "individuals with BDD have abnormal brain activation patterns when viewing their own face, showing hyperactivity in primary and secondary visual processing regions for [blurred] faces and hyperactivity in frontostriatal systems for [normal] faces," noted the researchers. This tendency to focus in on the details at the expense of an "ability to contextualize them configurally or holistically" might be at the root of the disorder and "suggests aberrant activity patterns for faces in general," the researchers wrote.

    The severity of these effects appeared to correlate with the level of BBD symptoms in people who had the disorder.

    These cognitive patterns, the scientists report, represent "preliminary evidence of a possible similarity in functional neuroanatomy between BDD and obsessive-compulsive disorder."

    臉蛋不夠漂亮： 腦部掃描發現了導致人們認為自己很丑的一種疾病。

    雖然我們生活在一個對身體和容貌苛求完美的文化環境里面，但是大多數美國人對他們自己的形態和面容還是有一個相對現實的認識-他們接受自己的雀斑、身體上某些部位比較肥胖等缺點。不過，有大約1-2%的人罹患一種稱為軀體變形障礙（body dysmorphic disorder,簡稱BDD）的心理疾病，這種疾病讓患者對自己的身體缺點憂心忡忡，他們認為這些缺點讓他們看起來十分討厭。這種傾向能導致一些人做極端而且頻繁的美容手術，甚至導致一些人自殺。

    一項新的研究使用腦部掃描技術來觀察患者的內心在看人臉時候是如何反應的？,患者們既看自己的臉，也看別人的臉。這項研究結果在線發表在2月1日的《普通精神病學文獻》（Archives of General Psychiatry）雜志上，該研究顯示患有BDD疾病的人看起來非常關注細節，而且可能患有強迫癥。

    這項新的病例對照研究使用功能核磁共振成像技術（functional magnetic-resonance imaging,簡稱fMRI）研究人們在看他們自己的以及大眾明星的面部圖片的時候的腦部活動情況。有33人參與了這項研究，其中17人作為對照，另外16人患有BDD.以前的研究和臨床觀察發現，患有BDD的人容易"把主要精力集中在他們面容的細節上，而忽視了整體因素。"

    因此就有了接下來的研究，研究者們（由來自加利福尼亞大學洛杉磯分校大衛格芬醫學院的 Jamie Feusner領導）給被試看一些標準的照片和一些修改過的照片，在這些修改過的照片中，一些照片僅僅只留下細節，而另外一些照片只留下一些基本的、模糊的信息。

    雖然這項研究規模很小，但是研究者們發現，患有BDD的人和控制組的人在看這些面部圖片的時候，他們大腦的反應有顯著的差異。對這些腦部掃描進行分析后，研究者們發現"患有BDD的人在觀看他們自己面部的時候，他們的大腦活動顯示異常活躍，當他們觀看[模糊]面部圖像的時候，他們的一級和二級視覺加工區域表現非常活躍，而當他們觀看[正常]面部圖像的時候，他們的額紋狀體系統非常活躍。"研究者們在論文中寫到："這種只對細節的關注而不是把細節放到整體環境中來考慮的傾向可能是BDD的根源，這也大體上解釋說明了在觀看面部圖片時大腦的反常活動模式"

    這種影響的嚴重程度與患者的BDD癥狀的嚴重程度相關。

    科學家們在研究報告中稱，這些認知模式初步顯示"在功能神經解剖學上，BDD和強迫癥可能存在相似的地方。"

    Vocabulary:

    Perceive: 注意到；意識到；認為

    Ugly: 丑陋的

    Obsess: 使癡迷

    Flawless: 完美的；無瑕的

    Blemish: 斑點；疤痕

    Bulge: （身體的）肥胖部位

    Psychological: 心理的

    Body Dysmorphic Disorder: 軀體變形障礙

    Preoccupy: 使日夜思考；使憂心忡忡

    Defect:缺點；缺陷

    Repugnant:令人討厭的

    Plastic Surgery: 美容手術

    Psychiatry: 精神病學

    Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: 強迫癥

    Celebrity: 名人

    Clinical: 臨床的

    Configural: 格局的

    Lead: 實例；范例；榜樣

    Blur: 模糊

    Distinct: 顯著的

    Abnormal: 不正常的

    Hyperactivity: 過度活躍

    Frontostriatal system:額紋狀體系統

    Contextualize: 將…置于背景中考慮

    Holistically: 整體地；全面地

    Aberrant: 反常的；異常的；違反常規的

    Severity: 嚴重性

    Correlate: 相互關聯

    Cognitive: 認知的

    Preliminary: 初步的；開始的

    Neuroanatomy: 神經解剖學