Members

Tomas Furmark Associate Professor, Ph.D. 2000, Uppsala University Dept. of Psychology Visiting address: Trädgårdsgatan 20 Postal address: Box 1225, SE-751 42 Uppsala, Sweden Phone: +46 18 471 21 53 Mobile: Fax: +46 18 471 21 23 E-mail: tomas.furmark@psyk.uu.se

Research Interests and Current Projects

My scientific interest is focused on the relation between brain functioning and anxiety. I am particularly interested in the neurofunctional changes underlying the beneficial effects of psychosocial and pharmacological treatments of anxiety disorders. We have in a number of positron emission tomography (PET) studies characterized brain activation patterns in patients with social phobia (social anxiety disorder) before and after treatment with cognitive-behavior therapy, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors and neurokinin-1 receptor antagonists. We are also interested in studying social phobia and other anxiety disorder by means of PET-tracers that can quantify neurotransmitter and receptor characteristics in the brain, such as serotonin synthesis. We also relate neuroimaging data to psychophysiological measures (e.g., heart rate, electrodermal activity), stress hormones (e.g., cortisol), personality scales (e.g., neuroticism), and genes controlling various neurotransmitter functions (e.g., serotonergic candidate genes).

In addition to neuroimaging, I also have a background in epidemiology. For example, I have studied the prevalence of social phobia and social fears in the Swedish general population and reviewed international studies on this topic. A more recent interest is the use of Internet in the administration of cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT). In a series of randomized controlled trials, we have evaluated an Internet-based self-help program, with minimal (e-mail) therapist contact, in the treatment of social phobia. In the future, it would be interesting to evaluate combined treatments of CBT self-help programs and psychoactive drugs in relation to monotherapies.

Selected Publications

Articles in journal

Öst, L-G., Ferebee, I. , & Furmark, T. (1997). One-session group therapy of spider phobia: Direct versus indirect treatments . Behaviour Research and Therapy, 35, 721-732.

Furmark, T., Fischer, H., Wik, G., Larsson, M., & Fredrikson, M. (1997). The amygdala and individual differences in human fear conditioning. NeuroReport, 8, 3957-3960.

Fredrikson, M., Furmark, T., Tillfors Olsson, M., Fischer, H., Andersson, J., & Långström, B. (1998). Functional neuroanatomical correlates of electrodermal activity: A positron emission tomographic study. Psychophysiology, 35, 179-185.

Fischer, H., Andersson, J. L. R., Furmark, T., & Fredrikson, M. (1998). Brain correlates of an unexpected panic attack: a human positron emission tomographic study . Neuroscience Letters, 251, 137-140.

Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Everz, P.-O., Marteinsdottir, I. , Gefvert, O., & Fredrikson, M. (1999). Social phobia in the general population: prevalence and sociodemographic profile. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 34, 416-424.

Fischer, H., Furmark, T., Wik, G., & Fredrikson, M. (2000). Brain representation of habituation to repeated complex visual stimulation studied with PET. NeuroReport, 11, 123-126.

Fischer, H., Andersson, J. L R., Furmark, T., & Fredrikson, M. (2000). Fear conditioning and brain activity: A positron emission tomography study in humans. Behavioral Neuroscience, 114, 671-680.

Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Stattin, H., Ekselius, L., & Fredrikson, M. (2000). Social phobia subtypes in the general population revealed by cluster analysis. Psychological Medicine, 30, 1335-1344.

Andersson, G., Lyttkens, L., Hirvelä, C., Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., & Fredrikson, M. (2000). Regional cerebral blood flow during tinnitus: a PET case-study with lidocaine and auditory stimulation. Acta Oto-Laryngologica, 120, 967-972.

Ekselius, L., Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., & Fredrikson, M. (2001). Personality disorders in the general population: DSM-IV and ICD-10 defined prevalence as related to sociodemographic profile. Personality and Individual Differences, 30, 311-320.

Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., Ekselius, L., & Fredrikson, M. (2001). Social phobia and avoidant personality disorder as related to parental history of social anxiety: A general population study. Behaviour Research and Therapy , 39, 289-298.

Marteinsdottir, I. , Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Fredrikson, M., & Ekselius, L. (2001). Personality traits in social phobia. European Psychiatry, 16, 143-150.

Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., Marteinsdottir, I. , Fischer, H., Pissiota, A., Långström. B., & Fredrikson, M. (2001). Cerebral blood flow in subjects with social phobia during stressful speaking tasks: A PET-study. American Journal of Psychiatry , 158, 1220-1226.

Fischer, H., Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., & Fredrikson, M. (2001). Dispositional pessimism and amygdala activity: A PET study in healthy volunteers. NeuroReport, 12, 1635-1638.

Furmark, T. (2002). Social phobia: Overview of community surveys. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 105, 84-93.

Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Marteinsdottir, I. , Fischer, H., Pissiota, A., Långström. B., & Fredrikson, M. (2002). Common changes in cerebral blood flow in patients with social phobia treated with citalopram or cognitive-behavioral therapy. Archives of General Psychiatry , 59, 425-433.

Fischer, H., Andersson, J. L R., Furmark, T., Wik, G. & Fredrikson, M. (2002). Right-sided human prefrontal brain activation during fear conditioning acquisition. Emotion, 2, 233-241.

Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., Marteinsdottir, I. , & Fredrikson, M. (2002). Cerebral blood flow during anticipation of public speaking in social phobia: A PET study. Biological Psychiatry, 52, 1113-1119.

Marteinsdottir, I. , Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., Anderberg, U. M., & Ekselius, L. (2003). Personality dimensions measured by the Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI) in subjects with social phobia in relation to personality disorders. Nordic Journal of Psychiatry, 57, 29-35.

Fredrikson, M., & Furmark, T. (2003). Amygdaloid regional cerebral blood flow and subjective fear during symptom provocation in anxiety disorders. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 985, 341-347.

Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., Ekselius, L., & Fredrikson, M. (2004). Social phobia and avoidant personality disorder: One spectrum disorder? Nordic Journal of Psychiatry, 58 , 147-152.

Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Garpenstrand, H., Marteinsdottir, I. , Långström, B., Oreland,L., & Fredrikson, M. (2004). Serotonin transporter polymorphism related to amygdala excitability and symptom severity in patients with social phobia. Neuroscience Letters, 362 , 189-192.

Fehm, L., Pelissolo, A., Furmark, T., & Wittchen, H.-U. (2005). Size and burden of social phobia in Europe . European Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology, 15 , 453-462 .

Furmark, T., Appel, L., Michelgård, Å., Wahlstedt, K., Åhs, F., Zancan, S., Jacobsson, E., Flyckt, K., Grohp, M., Bergström, M., Merlo Pich, E., Nilsson, L. G., Bani, M., Långström, B., & Fredrikson, M. (2005). Cerebral blood flow changes after treatment of social phobia with the neurokinin-1 antagonist GR205171, citalopram, or placebo. Biological Psychiatry, 58 , 132-142 .

Carlbring, P., Furmark, T., Steczkó, J., Ekselius, L., & Andersson, G. (2006). An open study of Internet-based bibliotherapy with minimal therapist contact via e-mail for social phobia. Clinical Psychologist, 10, 30-38.

Book chapters

Fredrikson, M., & Furmark, T. (2001). Brain imaging in affective neuroscience. In W. E. Craighead & C. B. Nemeroff (Eds.), The Corsini Encyclopedia of Psychology and Behavioral Science , 3 rd edition, vol 1 (pp. 234-236). New York : John Wiley & Sons.

Andersson, G., E, T., Furmark, T., Hirvelä, C., & Fredrikson, M. (2002). Changes in cerebral blood flow during cognitive distraction in tinnitus patients. In R. Patuzzi (Ed.), Proceedings of the seventh International Tinnitus Seminar (pp. 127-130). Freemante , Australia : University of Western Australia .

Fredrikson, M., & Furmark, T. (2004). Brain imaging studies in social anxiety disorder. In: Bandelow, B., & Stein, D. J. (Eds.), Social Anxiety Disorder (pp. 215-233). New York : Marcel Dekker.

Fredrikson, M., & Furmark, T. (2005). Motivation och Emotion. In: P. Hwang, I. Lundberg, J. Rönnberg, A-C. Smedler (Red.), Vår tids psykologi. (pp. 91-132). Stockholm : Natur och Kultur.

Fredrikson, M., & Furmark, T. (2006). Brain mechanisms in stress and negative affect. In B. Arnetz & R. Ekman (Eds), Handbook of Stress. New York : John Wiley & Sons, in press.

Doctoral dissertation

Furmark, T. (2000). Social phobia. From Epidemiology to Brain Function. Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis. Comprehensive Summaries of Uppsala Dissertations from the Faculty of Social Sciences 97.

Conference abstracts (peer reviewed)

Furmark, T., Fischer H., Wik, G., & Fredrikson, M. (1996). Functional neuroanatomy of classically conditioned electrodermal responses. Psychophysiology, 33, Suppl. 1, S38.

Versluys, L, Furmark, T., Fischer, H., Wik, G., & Fredrikson, M. (1996). Order effects related to habituation in the central and peripheral nervous systems Psychophysiology, 33, Suppl. 1, S86.

Fischer, H., Andersson, J., Furmark, T., & Fredrikson, M. (1997). Brain activation during emotional learning: A PET study of orienting, sensitization, and classical conditioning to evolutionary fear-relevant and fear irrelevant stimuli. Neuroimage, 5, S595.

Furmark, T., Fischer, H., Wik, G., & Fredrikson, M. (1997). Individual differences in fear-conditioning and amygdalar activity: A PET study in humans. Neuroimage, 5, S596.

Tillfors Olsson, M., Fischer, H., Furmark, T., Andersson, J., Wik, G., & Fredrikson, M. (1997). Cerebral correlates of state anxiety in a Pavlovian fear conditioning paradigm. Neuroimage, 5, S597.

Tillfors Olsson, M., Furmark, T., Fischer, H., Andersson, J. Wik, G., & Fredrikson, M. (1998). The human anterior cingulate cortex is involved in individual differences in Pavlovian fear conditioning. Neuroimage, 7 , S913.

Fischer, H., Andersson, J. L. R., Furmark, T., & Fredrikson, M. (1998). Neuroanatomy of human fear conditioning: Brain activity specifically related to stimuli processing and memory formation. Neuroimage, 7, S914.

Furmark, T., Fischer, H., Andersson, J., & Fredrikson, M. (1998). A PET case study of an unexpected panic attack. Neuroimage, 7, S919.

Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Marteindsottir, I. , Fischer, H., Pissiota, A., & Fredrikson, M. (1999). The effects of cognitive behavioral therapy on the neural correlates of anxiety provocation in social phobia: A PET-study. Neuroimage, 9 , S630.

Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., Marteindsottir, I. , Fischer, H., Pissiota, A., Långström, B., & Fredrikson, M. (1999). Functional neuroanatomy of social anxiety provocation: A comparison between individuals with social phobia and healthy controls. Neuroimage, 9, S631.

Andersson, G., Fredrikson, M., Furmark, T., Hirvelä, C., Lyttkens, L., & Tillfors, M. (1999). Funktionell neuroanatomi vid tinnitus In: Svenska Läkaresällskapets Rikstämma 30 nov -1 dec 1999, 108 (pp. 283). Stockholmsmässan Älvsjö: Svenska Läkaresällskapets handlingar. Hygiea.

Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., Marteinsdottir, I. , & Fredrikson, M. (2000). Functional neuroanatomy of anticipatory anxiety in social phobics: A PET study. Neuroimage, 11, S211.

Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Marteinsdottir, I. & Fredrikson, M. (2000). Subcortical predictors of long-term treatment outcome in patients with social phobia revealed by PET and discriminant analysis. Neuroimage, 11, S213.

Andersson, G., Furmark, T., Hirvelä, C., Lyttkens, L., Tillfors, M., & Fredrikson, M. (2000). Tinnitus: Funktionell Neuroanatomi. Svensk ÖNH-tidskrift, 7, 21.

Marteinsdottir, I. , Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Ågren, H., Hartvig, P., Fredrikson, M., Långström, B., Fischer, H., Antoni, G., & Hagberg, G. (2001). Presynaptic serotonin imaging in social phobia using [3- 11 C]-5-hydroxy-L-tryptophan and PET. Nordic Journal of Psychiatry, 55, S98.

Marteinsdottir, I. , Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Ågren, H., Hartvig, P., Fredrikson, M., Långström, B., Fischer, H., Antoni, G., & Hagberg, G. (2001). Presynaptic serotonin imaging in social phobia using [3- 11 C]-5-hydroxy-L-tryptophan and PET. Neuroimage, 13, S1070.

Fischer, H., Tillfors, M., Furmark, T., & Fredrikson, M. (2001). Pessimism and amygdala activity: A PET study. Neuroimage, 13, S398.

Furmark, T., Pissiota, A., Frans, Ö., Michelgård, Å., Linnander, C. H., Lewenhaupt, S., Appel, L., Långström, B., & Fredrikson, M. (2002). Decreased regional cerebral blood flow in the prefrontal cortex during fear provocation: A PET study of specific phobia [CD-ROM]. Neuroimage, Abstract from: Eight International Conference on Functional Mapping of the Human Brain, June 2-6, 2002 Sendai , Japan .

Åhs, F., Michelgård, Å., Fredrikson, M., Wolf, O. T., Kirschbaum, C., Appel, L., & Furmark, T. (2003). Central neural correlates of salivary cortisol in social phobics performing a speech. Psychophysiology, 40, Suppl. 1, S21.

Furmark, T., Tillfors, M., Garpenstrand, H., Marteinsdottir, I. , Långström, B., Oreland, L., & Fredrikson, M. (2004). Serotonin transporter genetic variation, amygdala activity and symptom severity in social phobia. Biological Psychiatry , 55 , Suppl. 8, 69S

Åhs, F., Michelgård, Å., Fredrikson, M., Wolf, O. T., Kirschbaum, C., Appel, L., Furmark, T. (2004). Central neural correlates of salivary cortisol during stress in subjects with social phobia. Biological Psychiatry , 55 , Suppl. 8, 211S.

Linnman, C., Michelgård, Å., Åhs, F., Fredrikson, M., Furmark, T. (2004). State Anxiety and Social Phobia: A PET Study. Biological Psychiatry , 55 , Suppl. 8, 57S.

Andersson, G., Holmstrom, A., Sparthan, L., Furmark, T., Carlbring, P. (2004). Treatment of social phobia via the Internet. Results from a RCT and some clinical observations. European Psychiatry, 19 , Suppl. 1, 109S

Carlbring, P., Holmström, A., Sparthan, E., Furmark, T., Nilsson-Ihrfelt, E., Buhrman, M., Ekselius, L. & Andersson, G. (2004). Ett Internetbaserat självhjälpsprogram i kombination med gruppträffar för personer med social fobi. In: Svenska Läkaresällskapets Rikstämma 24-26 november 2004, 112:2 (p. 78). Svenska Mässan Göteborg: Svenska Läkaresällskapets handlingar. Hygiea.

Fredrikson, M., Furmark T., & Tillfors M. (2005). Sites of action of cognitive and drug therapies in anxiety. International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology, 7, Suppl. 1 , S17-S18.

Linnman, C., Faria, V., Åhs, F., Michelgård, Å, Pissiota, A., Björkvi, S., Zancan, S, Merlo Pich, E., Bani, M., Fredrikson, M., Appel, L., & Furmark, T. (2005). Neurofunctional placebo response in social anxiety disorder during public speech. Biological Psychiatry , 57, Suppl. S Apr 15, 170S-171S 621.

Åhs, F, Bjurström, A, Fredrikson, M., Furmark, T., Pissiota, A., Linnman, C., Michelgård, A., Appel, L., Bani, M., Merlo Pich, E., Zancan, S., Långström, B., Gustafsson, M. (2005). Connectivity analyses of regional cerebral blood flow during public speaking in individuals with social anxiety disorder. Biological Psychiatry , 57, Suppl. S Apr 15, 170S-170S 619.

Furmark, T., Åhs, F., Linnman, C., Pissiota, A., Michelgard, Å., Hellqvist, A., Hernefalk, S., Flyckt, K., Appel, L., Bani, M., Merlo Pich, E., Zancan, S., Fredrikson, M. (2005). Amygdalar activity during emotional perception and experience in subjects with social phobia. Biological Psychiatry , 57, Suppl. S Apr 15, 170S-170S 620.