Cerebellar Neurostimulation for Boosting Social and Affective Functions: Implications for the Rehabilitation of Hereditary Ataxia Patients

Beyond motor deficits, spinocerebellar ataxia patients also suffer cognitive decline and show socio-affective difficulties, negatively impacting on their social functioning. The possibility to modulate cerebellocerebral networks involved in social cognition through cerebellar neurostimulation has opened up potential therapeutic applications for ameliorating social and affective difficulties. The present review offers an overview of the research on cerebellar neurostimulation for the modulation of socioaffective functions in both healthy individuals and different clinical populations, published in the time period from 2000 to 2022. A total of 25 records reporting either transcranial magnetic stimulation or transcranial direct current stimulation studies were found. The investigated clinical populations comprised different pathological conditions, including but not limited to spinocerebellar ataxia syndromes. The reviewed evidence supports that cerebellar neurostimulation is effective in improving social abilities in healthy individuals and reducing social and affective symptoms in different neurological and psychiatric populations associated with cerebellar damage or with impairments in functions that involve the cerebellum. These findings encourage to further explore the rehabilitative effects of cerebellar neurostimulation on socioaffective deficits experienced by patients with cerebellar abnormalities. Nevertheless, conclusions remain tentative at this stage due to the heterogeneity characterizing stimulation protocols, study methodologies and samples of patients.