社會學(xué)研究早已發(fā)現(xiàn)城市居民更易因壓力大出現(xiàn)精神疾病，而一項最新科學(xué)研究又為此提供了證據(jù),，其結(jié)果顯示,，在面臨壓力時，常在城市生活者和常在鄉(xiāng)村生活者的大腦會有不一樣的反應(yīng),。
英國《自然》雜志6月23日的封面文章說,，德國海德堡大學(xué)等機(jī)構(gòu)的研究人員進(jìn)行了相關(guān)試驗。32名學(xué)生志愿者參與了一項較難的數(shù)學(xué)測試,，并且在測試過程中會從耳機(jī)里聽到來自研究人員的負(fù)面消息,，說他們的進(jìn)度落后于平均水平，可能難以通過考試,。在受試者處于這種壓力較大的環(huán)境時,，研究人員用磁共振成像技術(shù)探測了他們大腦中不同部位的活動情況。
結(jié)果發(fā)現(xiàn),，那些當(dāng)時正生活在城市的學(xué)生,，大腦中的杏仁核活動增強(qiáng)，而生活在鄉(xiāng)村的學(xué)生沒有出現(xiàn)這種情況,；同時另一個名為扣帶皮層的部位活動情況也與城市生活背景有關(guān),，在城市中生活時間越長，這個部位的活動就越強(qiáng),。由于杏仁核和扣帶皮層的功能與負(fù)面情緒有關(guān),，“城市人”大腦的這種特點有助于解釋為什么他們更易出現(xiàn)精神疾病。
由于城市生活涉及的各種因素復(fù)雜,，開展本次研究的科學(xué)家計劃和社會學(xué)家合作,，通過跨學(xué)科的研究來探索究竟是哪些因素導(dǎo)致了大腦應(yīng)對壓力方式的變化。（生物谷Bioon.com）
生物谷推薦原文出處：
Nature doi:10.1038/nature10190
City living and urban upbringing affect neural social stress processing in humans
Florian Lederbogen; Peter Kirsch; Leila Haddad; Fabian Streit; Heike Tost; Philipp Schuch; Stefan Wüst; Jens C. Pruessner; Marcella Rietschel; Michael Deuschle; Andreas Meyer-Lindenberg
More than half of the world’s population now lives in cities, making the creation of a healthy urban environment a major policy priority1. Cities have both health risks and benefits1, but mental health is negatively affected: mood and anxiety disorders are more prevalent in city dwellers2 and the incidence of schizophrenia is strongly increased in people born and raised in cities3, 4, 5, 6. Although these findings have been widely attributed to the urban social environment2, 3, 7, 8, the neural processes that could mediate such associations are unknown. Here we show, using functional magnetic resonance imaging in three independent experiments, that urban upbringing and city living have dissociable impacts on social evaluative stress processing in humans. Current city living was associated with increased amygdala activity, whereas urban upbringing affected the perigenual anterior cingulate cortex, a key region for regulation of amygdala activity, negative affect9 and stress10. These findings were regionally and behaviourally specific, as no other brain structures were affected and no urbanicity effect was seen during control experiments invoking cognitive processing without stress. Our results identify distinct neural mechanisms for an established environmental risk factor, link the urban environment for the first time to social stress processing, suggest that brain regions differ in vulnerability to this risk factor across the lifespan, and indicate that experimental interrogation of epidemiological associations is a promising strategy in social neuroscience.
