Neural correlates of automatic emotion regulation and their association with suicidal ideation in adolescents during the first 90-days of residential care.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Suicide is the second leading cause of death for adolescents in the United States. However, relatively little is known about the forms of atypical neuro-cognitive function that are correlates of suicidal ideation (SI). One form of cognitive/affective function that, when dysfunctional, is associated with SI is emotion regulation. However, very little work has investigated the neural correlates of emotion dysregulation in adolescents with SI.

Methods

Participants (N = 111 aged 12-18, 32 females, 31 [27.9%] reporting SI) were recruited shortly after their arrival at a residential care facility where they had been referred for behavioral and mental health problems. Daily reports of SI were collected during the participants' first 90-days in residential care. Participants were presented with a task-fMRI measure of emotion regulation - the Affective Number Stroop task shortly after recruitment. Participants were divided into two groups matched for age, sex and IQ based on whether they demonstrated SI.

Results

Participants who demonstrated SI showed increased recruitment of regions including dorsomedial prefrontal cortex/supplemental motor area and parietal cortex during task (congruent and incongruent) relative to view trials in the context of emotional relative to neutral distracters.

Conclusions

Participants with SI showed increased recruitment of regions implicated in executive control during the performance of a task indexing automatic emotion regulation. Such data might suggest a relative inefficiency in the recruitment of these regions in individuals with SI.

SUBMITTER: Dobbertin M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10806086 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature