Imaging the neural effects of cognitive bias modification training

- Cognitive bias modification (CBM) has been shown to change clinically relevant behavior in anxiety, depression and addiction
- First neuroimaging studies suggest a role of the fronto-amygdalar circuitry in the efficacy of CBM in anxiety and addiction; and effects on connectivity between frontal gyrus, anterior cingulate and insula in depressive behavior
- Reviewed findings are of clinical importance and may provide insight into target regions for neuromodulatory techniques

Cognitive bias modification (CBM) was first developed as an experimental tool to examine the causal role of cognitive biases, and later developed into complementary interventions in experimental psychopathology research. CBM involves the “re-training” of implicit biases by means of multiple trials of computerized tasks, and has been demonstrated to change anxious, depressive and drug-seeking behavior, including clinically relevant effects. Recently, the field has progressed by combining CBM with neuroimaging techniques, which provides insight into neural mechanisms underlying how CBM affects implicit biases in anxiety, depression, and addiction, and potentially other pathologies. This narrative literature review summarizes the state of the art of studies on the neural effects of CBM and provides directions for future research in the field. A total of 13 published studies were found and discussed: n = 9 in anxiety, n = 2 in depressive behavior, and n = 2 in addiction.