Gender effect on pre-attentive change detection in major depressive disorder patients revealed by auditory MMN

•Gender difference in pre-attentive auditory processing was compared in MDD patients.•Deviant-standard reverse oddball paradigm was employed to obtain genuine MMN.•The increment frontal MMN was smaller in female patients compared to male patients.•Pre-attentive auditory processing was impaired only in female MDD patients.•The dysfunction of pre-attentive processing could be a trait of female patients.

Gender differences in rates of major depressive disorder (MDD) are well established, but gender differences in cognitive function have been little studied. Auditory mismatch negativity (MMN) was used to investigate gender differences in pre-attentive information processing in first episode MDD. In the deviant-standard reverse oddball paradigm, duration auditory MMN was obtained in 30 patients (15 males) and 30 age-/education-matched controls. Over frontal-central areas, mean amplitude of increment MMN (to a 150-ms deviant tone) was smaller in female than male patients; there was no sex difference in decrement MMN (to a 50-ms deviant tone). Neither increment nor decrement MMN differed between female and male patients over temporal areas. Frontal-central MMN and temporal MMN did not differ between male and female controls in any condition. Over frontal-central areas, mean amplitude of increment MMN was smaller in female patients than female controls; there was no difference in decrement MMN. Neither increment nor decrement MMN differed between female patients and female controls over temporal areas. Frontal-central MMN and temporal MMN did not differ between male patients and male controls. Mean amplitude of increment MMN in female patients did not correlate with symptoms, suggesting this sex-specific deficit is a trait- not a state-dependent phenomenon.