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Effect of Early Adversity and Childhood Internalizing Symptoms on Brain Structure in Young Men.

ABSTRACT: IMPORTANCE:Early adversity is an important risk factor that relates to internalizing symptoms and altered brain structure. OBJECTIVE:To assess the direct effects of early adversity and child internalizing symptoms (ie, depression, anxiety) on cortical gray matter (GM) volume, as well as the extent to which early adversity associates with variation in cortical GM volume indirectly via increased levels of internalizing symptoms. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS:A prospective investigation of associations between adversity within the first 6 years of life, internalizing symptoms during childhood and early adolescence, and altered brain structure in late adolescence (age, 18-21 years) was conducted in a community-based birth cohort in England (Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children). Participants from the cohort included 494 mother-son pairs monitored since the mothers were pregnant (estimated date of delivery between April 1, 1991, and December 31, 1992). Data collection for the present study was conducted between April 1, 1991, and November 30, 2010; the neuroimaging data were collected between September 1, 2010, and November 30, 2012, and data analyses for the present study occurred between January 25, 2013, and February 15, 2015. Risk factors were adversity within the first 6 years of the child's life (including prenatal exposure) and the child's internalizing symptoms between age 7 and 13 years. EXPOSURES:Early childhood adversity. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES:The main outcome was GM volume of cortical regions previously associated with major depression measured through T1-weighted magnetic resonance images collected in late adolescence. RESULTS:Among 494 young men included in this analysis, early adversity was directly associated with lower GM volumes in the anterior cingulate cortex (? =?-.18; P =?.01) and higher GM volume in the precuneus (? =?.18; P =?.009). Childhood internalizing symptoms were associated with lower GM volume in the right superior frontal gyrus (? =?-.20; P =?.002). Early adversity was also associated with higher levels of internalizing symptoms (? =?.37; P

SUBMITTER: Jensen SK

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5137198 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Effect of Early Adversity and Childhood Internalizing Symptoms on Brain Structure in Young Men.

Jensen Sarah K G SK Dickie Erin W EW Schwartz Deborah H DH Evans C John CJ Dumontheil Iroise I Paus Tomáš T Barker Edward D ED

JAMA pediatrics 20151001 10

<h4>Importance</h4>Early adversity is an important risk factor that relates to internalizing symptoms and altered brain structure.<h4>Objective</h4>To assess the direct effects of early adversity and child internalizing symptoms (ie, depression, anxiety) on cortical gray matter (GM) volume, as well as the extent to which early adversity associates with variation in cortical GM volume indirectly via increased levels of internalizing symptoms.<h4>Design, setting, and participants</h4>A prospective ...[more]

PMID: 26280410

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Project description:BACKGROUND:Much research has focused on the deleterious neurobiological effects of childhood adversity that may underlie internalizing disorders. While most youth show emotional adaptation following adversity, the corresponding neural mechanisms remain poorly understood. METHODS:In this longitudinal community study, we examined the associations among childhood family adversity, adolescent internalizing symptoms, and their interaction on regional brain activation and amygdala/hippocampus functional connectivity during emotion processing in 132 adolescents. RESULTS:Consistent with prior work, childhood adversity predicted heightened amygdala reactivity to negative, but not positive, images in adolescence. However, amygdala reactivity was not related to internalizing symptoms. Furthermore, childhood adversity predicted increased fronto-amygdala connectivity to negative, but not positive, images, yet only in lower internalizing adolescents. Childhood adversity also predicted increased fronto-hippocampal connectivity to negative images, but was not moderated by internalizing. These findings were unrelated to adolescence adversity or externalizing symptoms, suggesting specificity to childhood adversity and adolescent internalizing. CONCLUSIONS:Together, these findings suggest that adaptation to childhood adversity is associated with augmentation of fronto-subcortical circuits specifically for negative emotional stimuli. Conversely, insufficient enhancement of fronto-amygdala connectivity, with increasing amygdala reactivity, may represent a neural signature of vulnerability for internalizing by late adolescence. These findings implicate early childhood as a critical period in determining the brain's adaptation to adversity, and suggest that even normative adverse experiences can have significant impact on neurodevelopment and functioning. These results offer potential neural mechanisms of adaptation and vulnerability which could be used in the prediction of risk for psychopathology following childhood adversity.

Project description:Functional connectivity between the amygdala and the prefrontal cortex is critical for socioemotional processing, particularly during face processing. Though processing others' emotions is important for a myriad of complex social behaviors, more research is needed to understand how different types of emotional facial expressions differentially elicit connectivity of the amygdala with widespread neural regions. Moreover, though prior studies have reported cross-sectional associations between altered amygdala-prefrontal cortex functional connectivity and internalizing symptoms (e.g., depression, anxiety), few studies have examined whether amygdala functional connectivity is prospectively related to changes in these symptoms, with little work focusing on low-income men living in stressful contexts. The current study used psycho-physiological interaction analyses at the within-subjects level to examine how amygdala connectivity differed while participants viewed fearful, angry, and neutral faces. We used structural equation modeling at the between-subjects level, using extracted parameter estimates, to test whether amygdala connectivity during face processing predicted increases in internalizing psychopathology over time, controlling for earlier symptoms. An urban sample of 167 young men from low-income families was employed. Results indicated that negative connectivity between the amygdala and prefrontal regions was modulated by emotional face type. Neuronal activity in the cingulate and frontal cortices was connected to amygdala reactivity during fearful and neutral, but not angry, face processing. Moreover, weaker left amygdala-left middle frontal gyrus negative connectivity when viewing fearful faces and stronger right amygdala-left inferior frontal gyrus negative connectivity when viewing neutral faces at age 20 both predicted increases in internalizing behaviors from age 20 to age 22. Our findings show that amygdala-prefrontal cortex connectivity can predict the persistence of internalizing symptoms among high-risk participants over time but suggest that these patterns may differ depending on the emotional stimuli examined.

Dataset Information

Effect of Early Adversity and Childhood Internalizing Symptoms on Brain Structure in Young Men.

Publications

Effect of Early Adversity and Childhood Internalizing Symptoms on Brain Structure in Young Men.

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