Investigation of the neural substrates of voice recognition in Chinese schizophrenic patients with auditory verbal hallucinations: an event-related functional MRI study

Abstract

Objective: Auditory hallucinations (AVHs), like real auditory perceptions, are often perceived as familiar voices. Given that neural correlates of AVHs involve the auditory cortex, it is likely that those brain regions responsible for recognition of voice identity are invoked during AVHs.

Method: Schizophrenic patients with (n = 13) and without (n = 13) auditory hallucinations, and 13 healthy subjects performed a voice recognition task during functional magnetic resonance imaging at 1.5 T. In the task using prerecorded vocal stimuli, they classified voice as familiar and unfamiliar.

Results: Under the familiar minus unfamiliar contrasts, cerebral activation pattern is different in the three groups and patients with auditory hallucinations showed less activation in the right temporal lobe than controls.

Conclusion: Voice recognition was impaired in patients with AVHs. Our results support that auditory association cortices play a role in the perception of AVHs.