Laterality interacts with sex across the schizophrenia/bipolarity continuum: An interpretation of meta-analyses of structural MRI

Review of the first comprehensive meta-analysis of VBM (voxel-based morphometry) studies in schizophrenia indicates asymmetrical reductions of anterior cingulate gyrus to the right, and medial temporal lobe (including the uncus) and para-hippocampal gyrus to the left. In subsequent meta-analyses of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder change in these limbic structures is systematically related to change in the insula. Deficits in insula (and para-hippocampal gyrus) to the left, and dorsal anterior cingulate gyrus to the right are greater in schizophrenic psychoses whereas deficits in anterior cingulate to the left and insula to the right are greater in bipolar illness. Thus (1) brain structures implicated in schizophrenia include those implicated in bipolar disorder, (2) the variation that separates the prototypical psychoses may be a subset of that relating to the structural asymmetry (the “torque”) characteristic of the human brain, and (3) the meta-analysis of Bora et al. (2012) indicates that laterality of involvement of the insula and cingulate gyrus across the spectrum of bipolar and schizophrenic psychoses is critically dependent upon the sex ratio. Thus structural change underlying the continuum of psychosis relates to the interaction of laterality and sex.