Anxiety disorders (ADs) are a group of prevalent and destructive mental illnesses, but the current understanding of their underlying neuropathology is still unclear. Employing voxel-based morphometry (VBM), previous studies have demonstrated several common brain regions showing grey matter volume (GMV) abnormalities. However, contradictory results have been reported among these studies. Considering that different subtypes of ADs exhibit common core symptoms despite different diagnostic criteria, and previous meta-analyses have found common core GMV-altered brain regions in ADs, the present research aimed to combine the results of individual studies to identify common GMV abnormalities in ADs. Therefore, we first performed a systematic search in PubMed, Embase, and Web of Science on studies investigating GMV differences between patients with ADs and healthy controls (HCs). Then, the anisotropic effect-size signed differential mapping (AES-SDM) was applied in this meta-analysis. A total of 24 studies (including 25 data sets) were included in the current study, and 906 patients with ADs and 1003 HCs were included. Compared with the HCs, the patients with ADs showed increased GMV in the left superior parietal gyrus, right angular gyrus, left precentral gyrus, and right lingual gyrus, and decreased GMV in the bilateral insula, bilateral thalamus, left caudate, and right putamen. In conclusion, the current study has identified some abnormal GMV brain regions that are related to the pathological mechanisms of anxiety disorders. These findings could contribute to a better understanding of the underlying neuropathology of ADs.

焦虑症（AD）是一组普遍存在且具有破坏性的精神疾病，但目前对其潜在神经病理学的理解仍不清楚。先前的研究采用基于体素的形态测量（VBM），证明了几个常见的大脑区域显示灰质体积（GMV）异常。然而，这些研究报告了相互矛盾的结果。考虑到AD的不同亚型尽管诊断标准不同，但表现出共同的核心症状，并且之前的荟萃分析发现AD中存在共同的核心GMV改变的大脑区域，本研究旨在结合个体研究的结果来识别AD中常见的GMV异常。因此，我们首先在 PubMed、Embase 和 Web of Science 中对 AD 患者和健康对照 (HC) 之间的 GMV 差异的研究进行了系统检索。然后，各向异性效应大小符号微分映射（AES-SDM）应用于该荟萃分析。本研究共纳入24项研究（包括25个数据集），共纳入906例AD患者和1003例HC患者。与HCs相比，AD患者左侧顶上回、右侧角回、左侧中央前回、右侧舌回GMV升高，双侧岛叶、双侧丘脑、左侧尾状核、右侧壳核GMV降低。总之，目前的研究已经确定了一些与焦虑症病理机制相关的异常GMV脑区。这些发现可能有助于更好地了解 AD 的潜在神经病理学。