Beta -adrenergic antagonism alters functional connectivity during associative processing in a preliminary study of individuals with and without autism

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Hegarty, J. P., Zamzow, R. M., Ferguson, B. J., Christ, S. E., Porges, E. C., Johnson, J. D., & Beversdorf, D. Q. (2019). Beta -adrenergic antagonism alters functional connectivity during associative processing in a preliminary study of individuals with and without autism. Autism, 24(3), 795-801. https://doi.org/10.1177/1362361319868633

Publication date: 15 Aug 2019 Added to AutiHub: 5 Oct 2026 Type: Article Article language: English
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Authors

Publication authors
7
Publication authors identified as autistic
1 / 7 (14.3%)
  1. John P. Hegarty *
  2. Rachel M Zamzow
  3. Bradley J Ferguson
  4. Shawn E Christ
  1. Eric C Porges
  2. Jeffrey D Johnson
  3. David Quentin Beversdorf

Abstract

Beta-adrenergic antagonism (e.g. propranolol) has been associated with cognitive/behavioral benefits following stress-induced impairments and for some cognitive/behavioral domains in individuals with autism spectrum disorder. In this preliminary investigation, we examined whether the benefits of propranolol are associated with functional properties in the brain. Adolescents/adults (mean age = 22.54 years) with (n = 13) and without autism spectrum disorder (n = 13) attended three sessions in which propranolol, nadolol (beta-adrenergic antagonist that does not cross the blood–brain barrier), or placebo was administered before a semantic fluency task during functional magnetic resonance imaging. Autonomic nervous system measures and functional connectivity between language/associative processing regions and within the fronto-parietal control, dorsal attention, and default mode networks were examined. Propranolol was associated with improved semantic fluency performance, which was correlated with the baseline resting heart rate. Propranolol also altered network efficiency of regions associated with semantic processing and in an exploratory analysis reduced functional differences in the fronto-parietal control network in individuals with autism spectrum disorder. Thus, the cognitive benefits from beta-adrenergic antagonism may be generally associated with improved information processing in the brain in domain-specific networks, but individuals with autism spectrum disorder may also benefit from additional improvements in domain-general networks. The benefits from propranolol may also be able to be predicted from baseline autonomic nervous system measures, which warrants further investigation.

Bibliography cited by this reference

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Cited bibliography overview

These indicators describe the bibliography cited by this publication. An author name is counted each time it appears in one cited reference, so the same person can be counted more than once. Names not yet linked to an author already present in AutiHub are treated as unknown, not as non-autistic. Last computed: 17 Oct 2026 01:01.

Cited references
28
With a DOI
27
Without a DOI, from raw bibliography text
1
1 / 28 (3.6%) cited references include at least one author identified as autistic.
References with data to complete
0 / 28 (0.0%)
References with detected author names
28 / 28 (100.0%)
Without detected author names
0
Without a structured title
0
Without a stable identifier
1
References with raw author names still to review
0
References with external metadata lookup issues
0
These indicators apply to cited references displayed on this page, after technical duplicates have been merged. A reference without a DOI can still support author statistics when a title and author names are available.
Author names detected in the cited bibliography
151
From DOI or external metadata
151
From validated raw bibliography text
0
Raw names already validated
0
Raw names still to review
0
28 / 151 (18.5%) names are linked to an author already present in AutiHub. 123 / 151 (81.5%) names are not yet linked.
Names linked to a person identified as autistic
1 / 151 (0.7%)
Calculated across all author names detected in the cited bibliography. Among names linked to an author already present in AutiHub: 1 / 28 (3.6%). Distinct people identified as autistic: 1 / 125 (0.8%).
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