Brain processing of pictures of children in men with pedophilic disorder: A positron emission tomography study

Publication date: Available online 24 December 2018Source: NeuroImage: ClinicalAuthor(s): Véronique Fonteille, Jérôme Redouté, Pierre Lamothe, Dominique Straub, Frank Lavenne, Didier Le Bars, Véronique Raverot, Virginie Moulier, Jean-Jacques Marchand, Aurélie Vittoz, Charlotte Leriche, Michel Pugeat, Serge StoléruAbstractAlthough structural and functional neuroimaging techniques have recently been used to investigate the mechanisms of sexual attraction to children, a hallmark of pedophilic disorder, the differences in the processing of child sexual stimuli between men attracted to children and those attracted to adults remain unclear. Here, our purpose was to identify through positron emission tomography the brain responses of 15 male outpatients with pedophilic disorder to validated visual sexual stimuli depicting children (VSSc) and to compare them with 15 male healthy controls matched for sexual orientation (to female or male adults), age, and handedness. The patients' sample comprised both offenders and non-offenders. In response to VSSc, the between-groups analysis showed that activation in the right inferior temporal cortex [Brodmann area (BA) 20] was lower in patients than in controls. Moreover, in patients but not in controls, the presentation of VSSc induced an activation in a more caudal region of the right inferior temporal gyrus (BA 37) and in the left middle occipital gyrus (BA 19). In addition, in patients the level of activation in the caudal right infer...
Source: NeuroImage: Clinical - Category: Radiology Source Type: research