First person state/psychological imagery modulates the orbital frontal gyrus and the putamen in individuals with depression

Background: Patients with depression appear to imagine scenes preferentially from a 3rd person perspective as if they were observers. Methods: By using functional magnetic resonance imaging we asked patients with major depressive disorder (19, MDD) and healthy controls (19, HC) to imagine 1st person perspective state/psychological (vs. action) scenes. Results: We found that the left superior frontal gyrus (orbital part) and the right putamen were differentially activated by the state/psychological (vs. action) imagery (vs. letter detection) in MDD individuals vs. HC. Discussion: We suggest that imagery for state/psychological events increased activation in areas involved in self-related processing and personal perspective changes.