The present invention pertains to the evaluation and/or treatment of
psychopathological diseases. In one aspect, information regarding brain
activity, coupled with behavior tests (e.g., determining performance in a
computer-based task), may be used to predict the response of a subject to
psychological treatment, e.g., with a psychoactive drug. For example, the
subject may be one suffering from depression, or other disturbances of
the rostral anterior cingulate cortex. Another aspect of the present
invention is directed to methods for analyzing neurobiological predictors
through integration of information gathered from one or more levels of
analyses: (1) behavior, (2) brain function, and/or (3) genes. In one
aspect, the methods of the present invention can comprise any one of
these components (i.e., behavior, brain function, and genes), or a
combination of two or more of these components, and/or other components.
Through these methods, development of novel algorithms for improving the
ability to identify biological surrogate markers of treatment response
are disclosed, according to certain embodiments of the invention. Still
other aspects of the present invention are directed to systems and
methods for implementing such evaluation techniques, analyzing such
evaluation techniques, promotion of such evaluation techniques, and the
like.