The Effect of Oxytocin on Face Perception

The Behavioral and Neural Effects of Oxytocin on Face Perception in Congenital Prosopagnosia

The purpose of this study is to determine whether oxytocin affect face perception

Study Overview

• Status: Suspended
• Conditions: Healthy; Congenital Prosopagnosia
• Intervention / Treatment: Drug: Oxytocin; Drug: Placebo

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Anticipated): 100
• Phase: Early Phase 1

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Israel
  • Beer Sheva, Israel
    • Soroka Medical Center

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years to 80 years (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No
• Genders Eligible for Study: All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• normal or corrected to normal vision

Exclusion Criteria:

• minors
• pregnancy (according to a pregnancy test taken by subjects prior to participation)
• a history of asthma or nasal polyps
• cardiac disorders
• hyponatremia
• acute or chronic renal insufficiency
• liver cirrhosis
• neurological disease
• other chronic disease
• dementia, or lack of judgment

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Basic Science
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Crossover Assignment
• Masking: Double

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Other: Control group; Control group will be administered oxytocin and placebo, in a double-blind randomized order.	Drug: Oxytocin; Intervention will be examined on control group, and on experimental group as well.; Other Names: syntocinon; Drug: Placebo; Placebo will be given to control group and experimental group as well.
Experimental: congenital prosopagnosia; Congenital prosopagnosics will be administered oxytocin and placebo in a double-blind randomized order.	Drug: Oxytocin; Intervention will be examined on control group, and on experimental group as well.; Other Names: syntocinon; Drug: Placebo; Placebo will be given to control group and experimental group as well.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Memory performance	At the day participants will administer the substance, they will view a set of faces, of which they will be tested about 24 hours later. The measures that will be tested are %accuracy and %dwell time of eye movements towards each region in the faces the participants saw.	Day 2 (24 hours after encoding)

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Mood measurement	Participants will fill a PANAS mood questionnaire in order to monitor the effects of mood and fatigue of oxytocin/placebo. We will use ANOVA on the total score of the test in order to verify that differences in performance are not due to change in mood or fatigue after substance uptake.	Day 1 (after oxytocin/placebo uptake)

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Soroka University Medical Center
• Collaborators: Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Shelef Ilan, MD, Soroka University Medical Center; Principal Investigator: Galia Avidan, Ph.D, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev

Publications and helpful links

General Publications

• MacDonald E, Dadds MR, Brennan JL, Williams K, Levy F, Cauchi AJ. A review of safety, side-effects and subjective reactions to intranasal oxytocin in human research. Psychoneuroendocrinology. 2011 Sep;36(8):1114-26. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2011.02.015. Epub 2011 Mar 23.
• Avidan G, Behrmann M. Functional MRI reveals compromised neural integrity of the face processing network in congenital prosopagnosia. Curr Biol. 2009 Jul 14;19(13):1146-50. doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2009.04.060. Epub 2009 May 28.
• Avidan G, Behrmann M. Implicit familiarity processing in congenital prosopagnosia. J Neuropsychol. 2008 Mar;2(1):141-64. doi: 10.1348/174866407x260180.
• Avidan G, Hasson U, Malach R, Behrmann M. Detailed exploration of face-related processing in congenital prosopagnosia: 2. Functional neuroimaging findings. J Cogn Neurosci. 2005 Jul;17(7):1150-67. doi: 10.1162/0898929054475145.
• Behrmann M, Avidan G, Marotta JJ, Kimchi R. Detailed exploration of face-related processing in congenital prosopagnosia: 1. Behavioral findings. J Cogn Neurosci. 2005 Jul;17(7):1130-49. doi: 10.1162/0898929054475154.
• Hasson U, Avidan G, Deouell LY, Bentin S, Malach R. Face-selective activation in a congenital prosopagnosic subject. J Cogn Neurosci. 2003 Apr 1;15(3):419-31. doi: 10.1162/089892903321593135.
• Avidan G, Tanzer M, Hadj-Bouziane F, Liu N, Ungerleider LG, Behrmann M. Selective dissociation between core and extended regions of the face processing network in congenital prosopagnosia. Cereb Cortex. 2014 Jun;24(6):1565-78. doi: 10.1093/cercor/bht007. Epub 2013 Jan 31.

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start: November 1, 2013
• Primary Completion (Anticipated): December 1, 2016
• Study Completion (Anticipated): December 1, 2017

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: January 26, 2014
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 17, 2014
• First Posted (Estimate): March 19, 2014

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Estimate): July 2, 2015
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: July 1, 2015
• Last Verified: July 1, 2015

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: memory; oxytocin; face
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Nervous System Diseases; Neurologic Manifestations; Neurobehavioral Manifestations; Perceptual Disorders; Agnosia; Prosopagnosia; Physiological Effects of Drugs; Reproductive Control Agents; Oxytocics; Oxytocin
• Other Study ID Numbers: sor010712ctil; ISF, 384/10 (Other Grant/Funding Number: israeli Science Foundation)