Contrastive functional connectivity defines neurophysiology-informed symptom dimensions in major depression

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is highly heterogeneous, posing challenges for effective treatment due to complex interactions between clinical symptoms and neurobiological features. To address this, we apply contrastive principal-component analysis to fMRI-based resting-state functional connectivity, isolating disorder-specific variations by contrasting data from 233 MDD patients and 285 healthy controls. Subsequently, we use sparse canonical correlation analysis to identify two significant dimensions linking distinct brain circuits with clinical profiles. One dimension relates to an internalizing-externalizing symptom spectrum involving visual and limbic networks and is associated with cognitive task reaction times. The other dimension, linked to personality traits protective against depression (e.g., extraversion), is driven by dorsal attention network connections and correlates with cognitive control and psychomotor performance. This approach illuminates stable symptom dimensions and their neurophysiological underpinnings, aiding in precision phenotyping for MDD and supporting the development of targeted, individualized therapeutic strategies for mental health care.