vlPFC-vmPFC-Amygdala Interactions Underlie Age-Related Differences in Cognitive Regulation of Emotion

Experience-dependent neurodevelopment of self-regulation in adolescence

Adolescence is a period of rapid biobehavioral change, characterized in part by increased neural maturation and sensitivity to one's environment. In this review, we aim to demonstrate that self-regulation skills are tuned by adolescents' social, cultural, and socioeconomic contexts. We discuss adjacent literatures that demonstrate the importance of experience-dependent learning for adolescent development: environmental contextual influences and training paradigms that aim to improve regulation skills. We first highlight changes in prominent limbic and cortical regions-like the amygdala and medial prefrontal cortex-as well as structural and functional connectivity between these areas that are associated with adolescents' regulation skills. Next, we consider how puberty, the hallmark developmental milestone in adolescence, helps instantiate these biobehavioral adaptations. We then survey the existing literature demonstrating the ways in which cultural, socioeconomic, and interpersonal contexts drive behavioral and neural adaptation for self-regulation. Finally, we highlight promising results from regulation training paradigms that suggest training may be especially efficacious for adolescent samples. In our conclusion, we highlight some exciting frontiers in human self-regulation research as well as recommendations for improving the methodological implementation of developmental neuroimaging studies and training paradigms.

Differential functional organization of amygdala-medial prefrontal cortex networks in macaque and human

Over the course of evolution, the amygdala (AMG) and medial frontal cortex (mPFC) network, involved in behavioral adaptation, underwent structural changes in the old-world monkey and human lineages. Yet, whether and how the functional organization of this network differs remains poorly understood. Using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imagery, we show that the functional connectivity (FC) between AMG nuclei and mPFC regions differs between humans and awake macaques. In humans, the AMG-mPFC FC displays U-shaped pattern along the corpus callosum: a positive FC with the ventromedial prefrontal (vmPFC) and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), a negative FC with the anterior mid-cingulate cortex (MCC), and a positive FC with the posterior MCC. Conversely, in macaques, the negative FC shifted more ventrally at the junction between the vmPFC and the ACC. The functional organization divergence of AMG-mPFC network between humans and macaques might help understanding behavioral adaptation abilities differences in their respective socio-ecological niches.

Prefrontal engagement predicts the effect of museum visit on psychological well-being: an fNIRS exploration

Recent research suggests that museum visits can benefit psychological well-being by reducing symptoms of stress and anxiety. However, these reported relaxing effects remain inconsistent between studies. Shedding light on the underlying cerebral mechanisms of museum visits might support a better understanding of how it affects psychological well-being. This study aimed to investigate the prefrontal engagement evoked by artwork analysis during a museum visit and to determine if these prefrontal substrates are associated with the museum's effect on psychological well-being in older adults. Nineteen adults aged between 65 and 79, toured a Baroque-style exhibit at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts for approximately 20 minutes while equipped with a near-infrared spectroscopy system measuring the prefrontal cortex's hemodynamic activity. For each painting, participants received the instruction to either (1): analyze the painting and produce a personal interpretation of its signification (analytic condition) or (2) visualize the painting without any specific thoughts (visualization condition). Questionnaires measuring stress, anxiety, and well-being were administered before and after the visit. Sixteen older women (71.5 ± 4 years) were included in the analyses. Results showed that, at the group level, the analytic condition was associated with an increased activation pattern in the left ventrolateral prefrontal region, typically related to attentional processes (not observed in the visualization condition). The activation associated with the analytic condition predicted pre-/post-visit reductions in self-reported anxiety and stress in the sample of older women. These observations suggest that the level of engagement of attentional processes during artwork analysis may play a major role in the effect of a museum's visit on self-reported symptoms of anxiety.

Amygdala structure and function and its associations with social-emotional outcomes in a low-risk preterm sample

Amygdala atypical volume development and functional connectivity (FC) at small gestational ages (GA) have been found across childhood. This adult-oriented study assesses whether altered amygdala structure and function is present following low-risk preterm birth. T1-weighted and resting-state functional MRI images of 33 low-risk preterm (30-36 weeks' GA) and 29 full-term (37-42 weeks' GA) young adults of both sexes, aged between 20 and 32 years old, were analyzed using FreeSurfer (v6.0.0) and Coon Toolbox (v21.a). The social-emotional assessment included Happé's Strange Stories Test, the Moral Judgment Test, Delay-Discounting Test, Adult Self Report, and Emotion Regulation Questionnaire. No differences were found in social-emotional outcomes or amygdala volumes between the groups. Low-risk preterm young adults showed increased FC between the left amygdala, right amygdala and medial frontal cortex (MedFC) (F = 9.89, p-FWE = 0.009) at cluster level compared to their full-term peers. However, significant results at connection level were not observed between left and right amygdala. Lastly, increased FC at cluster level between the right amygdala and MedFC, and left amygdala and MedFC, was related to better social-emotional outcomes only in low-risk preterm young adults (F = 6.60, p-FWE = 0.036) at cluster level. At connection level, in contrast, only right amygdala-MedFC increased FC was significantly associated with better social-emotional outcomes. This study reveals that low-risk prematurity does not have an effect on social-emotional outcomes or structural amygdala volumes during young adulthood. However, individuals who were considered to be at a lower risk of exhibiting neurodevelopmental alterations following preterm birth demonstrated increased FC between the left and right amygdala and MedFC.

Goal-directed learning in adolescence: neurocognitive development and contextual influences

Adolescence is a time during which we transition to independence, explore new activities and begin pursuit of major life goals. Goal-directed learning, in which we learn to perform actions that enable us to obtain desired outcomes, is central to many of these processes. Currently, our understanding of goal-directed learning in adolescence is itself in a state of transition, with the scientific community grappling with inconsistent results. When we examine metrics of goal-directed learning through the second decade of life, we find that many studies agree there are steady gains in performance in the teenage years, but others report that adolescent goal-directed learning is already adult-like, and some find adolescents can outperform adults. To explain the current variability in results, sophisticated experimental designs are being applied to test learning in different contexts. There is also increasing recognition that individuals of different ages and in different states will draw on different neurocognitive systems to support goal-directed learning. Through adoption of more nuanced approaches, we can be better prepared to recognize and harness adolescent strengths and to decipher the purpose (or goals) of adolescence itself.

Major depressive disorder associated alterations in the effective connectivity of the face processing network: a systematic review

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is marked by altered processing of emotional stimuli, including facial expressions. Recent neuroimaging research has attempted to investigate how these stimuli alter the directional interactions between brain regions in those with MDD; however, methodological heterogeneity has made identifying consistent effects difficult. To address this, we systematically examined studies investigating MDD-associated differences present in effective connectivity during the processing of emotional facial expressions. We searched five databases: PsycINFO, EMBASE, PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science, using a preregistered protocol (registration number: CRD42021271586). Of the 510 unique studies screened, 17 met our inclusion criteria. These studies identified that compared with healthy controls, participants with MDD demonstrated (1) reduced connectivity from the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex to the amygdala during the processing of negatively valenced expressions, and (2) increased inhibitory connectivity from the ventromedial prefrontal cortex to amygdala during the processing of happy facial expressions. Most studies investigating the amygdala and anterior cingulate cortex noted differences in their connectivity; however, the precise nature of these differences was inconsistent between studies. As such, commonalities observed across neuroimaging modalities warrant careful investigation to determine the specificity of these effects to particular subregions and emotional expressions. Future research examining longitudinal connectivity changes associated with treatment response may provide important insights into mechanisms underpinning therapeutic interventions, thus enabling more targeted treatment strategies.

A normative model of brain responses to social scenarios reflects the maturity of children and adolescents' social-emotional abilities

The rapid brain maturation in childhood and adolescence accompanies the development of socio-emotional functioning. However, it is unclear how the maturation of the neural activity drives the development of socio-emotional functioning and individual differences. This study aimed to reflect the age dependence of inter-individual differences in brain responses to socio-emotional scenarios and to develop naturalistic imaging indicators to assess the maturity of socio-emotional ability at the individual level. Using three independent naturalistic imaging datasets containing healthy participants (n = 111, 21 and 122), we found and validated that age-modulated inter-individual concordance of brain responses to socio-emotional movies in specific brain regions. The similarity of an individual's brain response to the average response of older participants was defined as response typicality, which predicted an individual's emotion regulation strategies in adolescence and theory of mind (ToM) in childhood. Its predictive power was not superseded by age, sex, cognitive performance or executive function. We further showed that the movie's valence and arousal ratings grounded the response typicality. The findings highlight that forming typical brain response patterns may be a neural phenotype underlying the maturation of socio-emotional ability. The proposed response typicality represents a neuroimaging approach to measure individuals' maturity of cognitive reappraisal and ToM.

Age-related changes in neural responses to sensory stimulation in autism: a cross-sectional study

BACKGROUND

Sensory over-responsivity (SOR) is an impairing sensory processing challenge in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) which shows heterogenous developmental trajectories and appears to improve into adulthood in some but not all autistic individuals. However, the neural mechanisms underlying interindividual differences in these trajectories are currently unknown.

METHODS

Here, we used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate the association between age and neural activity linearly and nonlinearly in response to mildly aversive sensory stimulation as well as how SOR severity moderates this association. Participants included 52 ASD (14F) and 41 (13F) typically developing (TD) youth, aged 8.6-18.0 years.

RESULTS

We found that in pre-teens, ASD children showed widespread activation differences in sensorimotor, frontal and cerebellar regions compared to TD children, while there were fewer differences between ASD and TD teens. In TD youth, older age was associated with less activation in the prefrontal cortex. In contrast, in ASD youth, older age was associated with more engagement of sensory integration and emotion regulation regions. In particular, orbitofrontal and medial prefrontal cortices showed a nonlinear relationship with age in ASD, with an especially steep increase in sensory-evoked neural activity during the mid-to-late teen years. There was also an interaction between age and SOR severity in ASD youth such that these age-related trends were more apparent in youth with higher SOR.

LIMITATIONS

The cross-sectional design limits causal interpretations of the data. Future longitudinal studies will be instrumental in determining how prefrontal engagement and SOR co-develop across adolescence.

CONCLUSIONS

Our results suggest that enhanced recruitment of prefrontal regions may underlie age-related decreases in SOR for a subgroup of ASD youth.

Common and disorder-specific cortical thickness alterations in internalizing, externalizing and thought disorders during early adolescence: an Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development study

BACKGROUND

A growing body of neuroimaging studies has reported common neural abnormalities among mental disorders in adults. However, it is unclear whether the distinct disorder-specific mechanisms operate during adolescence despite the overlap among disorders.

METHODS

We studied a large cohort of more than 11 000 preadolescent (age 9-10 yr) children from the Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development cohort. We adopted a regrouping approach to compare cortical thickness (CT) alterations and longitudinal changes between healthy controls (n = 4041) and externalizing (n = 1182), internalizing (n = 1959) and thought disorder (n = 347) groups. Genome-wide association study (GWAS) was performed on regional CT across 4468 unrelated European youth.

RESULTS

Youth with externalizing or internalizing disorders exhibited increased regional CT compared with controls. Externalizing (p = 8 × 10-4, Cohen d = 0.10) and internalizing disorders (p = 2 × 10-3, Cohen d = 0.08) shared thicker CT in the left pars opercularis. The somatosensory and the primary auditory cortex were uniquely affected in externalizing disorders, whereas the primary motor cortex and higher-order visual association areas were uniquely affected in internalizing disorders. Only youth with externalizing disorders showed decelerated cortical thinning from age 10-12 years. The GWAS found 59 genome-wide significant associated genetic variants across these regions. Cortical thickness in common regions was associated with glutamatergic neurons, while internalizing-specific regional CT was associated with astrocytes, oligodendrocyte progenitor cells and GABAergic neurons.

LIMITATIONS

The sample size of the GWAS was relatively small.

CONCLUSION

Our study provides strong evidence for the presence of specificity in CT, developmental trajectories and underlying genetic underpinnings among externalizing and internalizing disorders during early adolescence. Our results support the neurobiological validity of the regrouping approach that could supplement the use of a dimensional approach in future clinical practice.

The VLPFC-Engaged Voluntary Emotion Regulation: Combined TMS-fMRI Evidence for the Neural Circuit of Cognitive Reappraisal

A clear understanding of the neural circuit underlying emotion regulation (ER) is important for both basic and translational research. However, a lack of evidence based on combined neuroimaging and neuromodulation techniques calls into question (1) whether the change of prefrontal-subcortical activity intrinsically and causally contributes to the ER effect; and (2) whether the prefrontal control system directly modulates the subcortical affective system. Accordingly, we combined fMRI recordings with transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to map the causal connections between the PFC and subcortical affective structures (amygdala and insula). A total of 117 human adult participants (57 males and 60 females) were included in the study. The results revealed that TMS-induced ventrolateral PFC (VLPFC) facilitation led to enhanced activity in the VLPFC and ventromedial PFC (VMPFC) as well as attenuated activity in the amygdala and insula during reappraisal but not during nonreappraisal (i.e., baseline). Moreover, the activated VLPFC intensified the prefrontal-subcortical couplings via the VMPFC during reappraisal only. This study provides combined TMS-fMRI evidence that downregulating negative emotion involves the prefrontal control system suppressing the subcortical affective system, with the VMPFC serving as a crucial hub within the VLPFC-subcortical network, suggesting an indirect pathway model of the ER circuit. Our findings outline potential protocols for improving ER ability by intensifying the VLPFC-VMPFC coupling in patients with mood and anxiety disorders.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT Using fMRI to examine the TMS effect, we uncovered that the opposite neural changes in prefrontal (enhanced) and subcortical (attenuated) regions are not a byproduct of emotion regulation (ER); instead, this prefrontal-subcortical activity per se causally contributes to the ER effect. Furthermore, using TMS to amplify the neural changes within the ER circuit, the "bridge" role of the VMPFC is highlighted under the reappraisal versus nonreappraisal contrast. This "perturb-and-measure" approach overcomes the correlational nature of fMRI data, helping us to identify brain regions that causally support reappraisal (the VLPFC and VMPFC) and those that are modulated by reappraisal (the amygdala and insula). The uncovered ER circuit is important for understanding the neural systems underlying reappraisal and valuable for translational research.

The influence of stress on the neural underpinnings of disinhibited eating: a systematic review and future directions for research

Disinhibited eating involves overconsumption and loss of control over food intake, and underpins many health conditions, including obesity and binge-eating related disorders. Stress has been implicated in the development and maintenance of disinhibited eating behaviours, but the mechanisms underlying this relationship are unclear. In this systematic review, we examined how the impact of stress on the neurobiological substrates of food-related reward sensitivity, interoception and cognitive control explains its role in disinhibited eating behaviours. We synthesised the findings of functional magnetic resonance imaging studies including acute and/or chronic stress exposures in participants with disinhibited eating. A systematic search of existing literature conducted in alignment with the PRISMA guidelines identified seven studies investigating neural impacts of stress in people with disinhibited eating. Five studies used food-cue reactivity tasks, one study used a social evaluation task, and one used an instrumental learning task to probe reward, interoception and control circuitry. Acute stress was associated with deactivation of regions in the prefrontal cortex implicated in cognitive control and the hippocampus. However, there were mixed findings regarding differences in reward-related circuitry. In the study using a social task, acute stress associated with deactivation of prefrontal cognitive control regions in response to negative social evaluation. In contrast, chronic stress was associated with both deactivation of reward and prefrontal regions when viewing palatable food-cues. Given the small number of identified publications and notable heterogeneity in study designs, we propose several recommendations to strengthen future research in this emerging field.

Continuity versus change in latent profiles of emotion regulation and working memory during adolescence

Significant structural and functional brain development occurs during early adolescence. These changes underlie developments in central neurocognitive processes such as working memory (WM) and emotion regulation (ER). The preponderance of studies modeling trajectories of adolescent brain development use variable-centered approaches, omitting attention to individual differences that may undergird neurobiological embedding of early life stress and attendant psychopathology. This preregistered, data-driven study used latent transition analysis (LTA) to identify (1) latent profiles of neural function during a WM and implicit ER task, (2) transitions in profiles across 24 months, and 3) associations between transitions, parental support, and subsequent psychopathology. Using two waves of data from the ABCD Study (Mage T1 = 10; Mage T2 = 12), we found three unique profiles of neural function at both T1 and T2. The Typical, Emotion Hypo-response, and Emotion-Hyper response profiles were characterized by, respectively: moderate amygdala activation and fusiform deactivation; high ACC, fusiform, and insula deactivation; and high amygdala, ACC, and insula response to ER. While 69.5 % remained in the Typical profile from T1 to T2, 27.8 % of the sample moved from one profile at T1 to another at T2. However, neither latent profiles nor transitions exhibited associations between parental support or psychopathology symptoms.

Reducing Anxiety and Social Stress in Primary Education: A Breath-Focused Heart Rate Variability Biofeedback Intervention

Primary school students suffer from high levels of anxiety and stress. Having emotional regulation abilities can help them to manage challenging emotional situations. Conscious and slow breathing is a physiological, emotional regulation strategy that is feasible for primary school students to learn. Following Polyvagal Theory and PMER Theory, this research presents the results of a breath-focused heart rate variability biofeedback intervention. The intervention aimed to reduce anxiety and physiological and social stress in primary school children. A total of 585 students (46.4% girls and 53.6% boys) from the same public school, aged between 7 and 12 years (M = 8.51; SD = 1.26), participated in this study. To assess the impact of training, a mixed design was used with two groups (Treatment and Control groups), two evaluation phases (Pretest and Post-test), and three educational cycles (first, second and third cycles). To examine heart rate variability, emWave software was used and anxiety and social stress were measured by the BASC II test. The results showed that after the intervention, the students learned to breathe consciously. Moreover, they reduced their levels of anxiety (M(SD)_pretest = 12.81(2.22) vs. M(SD)_posttest = 13.70(1.98)) and stress (M(SD)_pretest = 12.20(1.68) vs. M(SD)_posttest = 12.90(1.44)). The work also discusses the limitations and benefits of this type of intervention in primary schools.

Reappraisal-related downregulation of amygdala BOLD activation occurs only during the late trial window

During cognitive reappraisal, an individual reinterprets the meaning of an emotional stimulus to regulate the intensity of their emotional response. Prefrontal cortex activity has been found to support reappraisal and is putatively thought to downregulate the amygdala response to these stimuli. The timing of these regulation-related responses during the course of a trial, however, remains poorly understood. In the current fMRI study, participants were instructed to view or reappraise negative images and then rate how negative they felt following each image. The hemodynamic response function was estimated in 11 regions of interest for the entire time course of the trial including image viewing and rating. Notably, within the amygdala there was no evidence of downregulation in the early (picture viewing) window of the trial, only in the late (rating) window, which also correlated with a behavioral measure of reappraisal success. With respect to the prefrontal regions, some (e.g., inferior frontal gyrus) showed reappraisal-related activation in the early window, whereas others (e.g., middle frontal gyrus) showed increased activation primarily in the late window. These results highlight the temporal dynamics of different brain regions during emotion regulation and suggest that the amygdala response to negative images need not be immediately dampened to achieve successful cognitive reappraisal.

Virtual social interaction and loneliness among emerging adults amid the COVID-19 pandemic

Many social activities moved online during the global COVID-19 pandemic, yet research investigating whether virtual social interactions facilitate social connectedness has been inconclusive. In this study, participants completed online questionnaires assessing objective social isolation, loneliness, mental health, and virtual social interactions. There was clear evidence for worsening mental health among emerging adults during the COVID-19 pandemic characterized by large increases in depressive symptoms (mean increase = 8.35, 95% CI [6.97, 9.73], t(118) = 118, p < .001), and large decrements in happiness (mean decrease = -0.71, 95% CI [-0.84, -0.57], t(118) = 10.09, p < .001) and social satisfaction (mean decrease = -0.81, 95% CI [-1.00,-0.62], t(115) = 8.28, p < .001) post-pandemic onset. In line with expectations, those living in larger households amid the pandemic reported lower levels of loneliness and higher levels of happiness. A negative association was found between household size (an index of objective social isolation) and loneliness, b = -3.01, t(79) = 2.60, p = .011, 95% CI [-5.32, -0.71], and a positive association was found between household size and happiness, b = 22.86, t(75) = 3.30, p = .001, 95% CI [9.06, 36.65]. However, contrary to expectations, there was no association between loneliness and frequency of virtual social interactions. There was also no association between frequency of virtual social interactions and either happiness or depression. More research investigating social connectedness in the context of virtual social interactions is warranted.

Age-related change in task-evoked amygdala-prefrontal circuitry: A multiverse approach with an accelerated longitudinal cohort aged 4-22 years

The amygdala and its connections with medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) play central roles in the development of emotional processes. While several studies have suggested that this circuitry exhibits functional changes across the first two decades of life, findings have been mixed - perhaps resulting from differences in analytic choices across studies. Here we used multiverse analyses to examine the robustness of task-based amygdala-mPFC function findings to analytic choices within the context of an accelerated longitudinal design (4-22 years-old; N = 98; 183 scans; 1-3 scans/participant). Participants recruited from the greater Los Angeles area completed an event-related emotional face (fear, neutral) task. Parallel analyses varying in preprocessing and modeling choices found that age-related change estimates for amygdala reactivity were more robust than task-evoked amygdala-mPFC functional connectivity to varied analytical choices. Specification curves indicated evidence for age-related decreases in amygdala reactivity to faces, though within-participant changes in amygdala reactivity could not be differentiated from between-participant differences. In contrast, amygdala-mPFC functional connectivity results varied across methods much more, and evidence for age-related change in amygdala-mPFC connectivity was not consistent. Generalized psychophysiological interaction (gPPI) measurements of connectivity were especially sensitive to whether a deconvolution step was applied. Our findings demonstrate the importance of assessing the robustness of findings to analysis choices, although the age-related changes in our current work cannot be overinterpreted given low test-retest reliability. Together, these findings highlight both the challenges in estimating developmental change in longitudinal cohorts and the value of multiverse approaches in developmental neuroimaging for assessing robustness of results.

The Development of Cognitive Reappraisal From Early Childhood Through Adolescence: A Systematic Review and Methodological Recommendations

Cognitive reappraisal is an important emotion regulation strategy that shows considerable developmental change in its use and effectiveness. This paper presents a systematic review of the evidence base regarding the development of cognitive reappraisal from early childhood through adolescence and provides methodological recommendations for future research. We searched Scopus, PsycINFO, and ERIC for empirical papers measuring cognitive reappraisal in normative samples of children and youth between the ages of 3 and 18 years published in peer-reviewed journals through August 9th, 2018. We identified 118 studies that met our inclusion criteria. We first present a quantitative review of the methodologies used to investigate cognitive reappraisal in children and adolescents, with attention to variations in methodologies by the sample age range. We then present a qualitative review of findings with attention to: (1) the age at which children begin to effectively use cognitive reappraisal to regulate their emotions, and (2) developmental changes in cognitive reappraisal from early childhood through adolescence. We consider how methodological differences may contribute to inconsistencies in findings, highlight gaps in the literature that remain to be addressed, and make recommendations for future directions.

The association between peer-victimisation and structural and functional brain outcomes: A systematic review

Background

Peer adversity and aggression are common experiences in childhood and adolescence which lead to poor mental health outcomes. To date, there has been no review conducted on the neurobiological changes associated with relational peer-victimisation, bullying and cyberbullying.

Methods

This systematic review assessed structural and functional brain changes associated with peer-victimisation, bullying, and cyberbullying from 1 January 2000 to April 2021. A systematic search of Psychoinfo, Pubmed, and Scopus was performed independently by two reviewers using predefined criteria. Twenty-six studies met the selection criteria and were considered for review.

Results

The data collected shows altered brain activation of regions implicated in processing reward, social pain, and affect; and heightened sensitivity and more widespread activation of brain regions during acute social exclusion, most notably in the amygdala, left parahippocampal gyrus, and fusiform gyrus, associated with victimisation exposure. In addition, victimised youths also demonstrated greater risk-taking behaviours following acute social exclusion showing greater ventral striatum-inferior frontal gyrus coupling, activation in the bilateral amygdala, orbital frontal cortex (OFC), medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC), temporoparietal junction (TPJ), medial posterior parietal cortex (MPPC) and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC), suggesting greater social monitoring, seeking of inclusion, and more effortful cognitive control. The studies included participants from a very broad developmental age range, mostly using cross-sectional measure of peer-victimisation exposure, at varying developmental stages.

Conclusions

This review highlights the need for more neuroimaging studies in cyberbullying, as well as longitudinal studies across more diverse samples for investigating gender, age, and developmental interactions with peer-victimising. This also brings to attention the importance of addressing bullying victimisation particularly in adolescence, given the evidence for social stress in heightening developmentally sensitive processes which are associated with depression, anxiety, and externalising symptoms.

Shared and unique brain network features predict cognitive, personality, and mental health scores in the ABCD study

How individual differences in brain network organization track behavioral variability is a fundamental question in systems neuroscience. Recent work suggests that resting-state and task-state functional connectivity can predict specific traits at the individual level. However, most studies focus on single behavioral traits, thus not capturing broader relationships across behaviors. In a large sample of 1858 typically developing children from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study, we show that predictive network features are distinct across the domains of cognitive performance, personality scores and mental health assessments. On the other hand, traits within each behavioral domain are predicted by similar network features. Predictive network features and models generalize to other behavioral measures within the same behavioral domain. Although tasks are known to modulate the functional connectome, predictive network features are similar between resting and task states. Overall, our findings reveal shared brain network features that account for individual variation within broad domains of behavior in childhood.

Neurobiology of Parental Regulation of the Infant and Its Disruption by Trauma Within Attachment

The complex process of regulating physiological functions and homeostasis during external and internal disruptions develops slowly in altricial species, with parental care functioning as a co-regulator of infant physiological and emotional homeostasis. Here, we review our current understanding of the infant's use of parental behaviors for neurobehavioral regulation and its disruption with harsh parental care. Taking a cross-species view, we briefly review the human developmental literature that highlights the importance of the caregiver in scaffolding the child's physiological and emotional regulation, especially under threat and stress. We then use emerging corresponding animal literature within the phylogenetically preserved attachment system to help define neural systems supporting caregiver regulation and its supporting causal mechanism to provide translational bridges to inform causation and mechanisms impossible to define in children. Next, we briefly review animal research highlighting the impact of specific sensory stimuli imbedded in parental care as important for infant physiological and emotion regulation. We then highlight the importance of parental sensory stimuli gaining hedonic value to go beyond simple sensory stimuli to further impact neurobehavioral regulation, with poor quality of care compromising the infant's ability to use these cues for regulation. Clinically, parental regulation of the infant is correlated with later-life neurobehavioral outcome and quality of life. We suggest an understanding of this parental regulation of the infant's immediate neurobehavioral functioning within the context of attachment quality, that may provide insights into the complex processes during early life, initiating the pathway to pathology.

Effects of Parent Emotion Socialization on the Neurobiology Underlying Adolescent Emotion Processing: A Multimethod fMRI Study

Parents' emotion socialization (ES) practices impact socioemotional development throughout adolescence. Little is known, however, regarding the neurobiology underlying these effects. This study used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to examine how parent ES practices relate to adolescent brain function during emotion processing. Thirty-three adolescents (ages 14-16) reported on ES practices of a focal parent (primarily mothers) using the Emotions as a Child (EAC) Scale. Adolescents also completed a conflict discussion task with this parent, and parents' statements were coded for emotional valence. Adolescents performed two fMRI tasks: a standard emotion processing (EP) task (n = 32) and the Testing Emotional Attunement and Mutuality (TEAM) task (n = 27). The EP task consisted of viewing emotional pictures and either reacting naturally or using cognitive reappraisal to regulate emotional responses. The TEAM task was performed with the parent and included trials during which adolescents were shown that their parent made an error, costing the dyad $5. Parent negative verbalizations during the conflict discussion were associated with greater activity in the thalamus during the emotion reactivity condition of the EP task and in the thalamus, superior medial and superior frontal gyri, anterior insula, and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex during the costly error condition of the TEAM task. Unsupportive ES was associated with greater activity in the supplementary motor area and less activity in the paracentral gyrus and amygdala during the costly error condition of the TEAM task. This study supports the premise that ES influences adolescents' emotion-related neural processing, particularly when using ecologically valid tasks in social contexts.

Associations among Household and Neighborhood Socioeconomic Disadvantages, Resting-state Frontoamygdala Connectivity, and Internalizing Symptoms in Youth

Exposure to socioeconomic disadvantages (SED) can have negative impacts on mental health, yet SED are a multifaceted construct and the precise processes by which SED confer deleterious effects are less clear. Using a large and diverse sample of preadolescents (ages 9-10 years at baseline, n = 4038, 49% female) from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study, we examined associations among SED at both household (i.e., income-needs and material hardship) and neighborhood (i.e., area deprivation and neighborhood unsafety) levels, frontoamygdala resting-state functional connectivity, and internalizing symptoms at baseline and 1-year follow-up. SED were positively associated with internalizing symptoms at baseline and indirectly predicted symptoms 1 year later through elevated symptoms at baseline. At the household level, youth in households characterized by higher disadvantage (i.e., lower income-to-needs ratio) exhibited more strongly negative frontoamygdala coupling, particularly between the bilateral amygdala and medial OFC (mOFC) regions within the frontoparietal network. Although more strongly positive amygdala-mOFC coupling was associated with higher levels of internalizing symptoms at baseline and 1-year follow-up, it did not mediate the association between income-to-needs ratio and internalizing symptoms. However, at the neighborhood level, amygdala-mOFC functional coupling moderated the effect of neighborhood deprivation on internalizing symptoms. Specifically, higher neighborhood deprivation was associated with higher internalizing symptoms for youth with more strongly positive connectivity, but not for youth with more strongly negative connectivity, suggesting a potential buffering effect. Findings highlight the importance of capturing multilevel socioecological contexts in which youth develop to identify youth who are most likely to benefit from early interventions.

The prefrontal cortex, pathological anxiety, and anxiety disorders

Anxiety is experienced in response to threats that are distal or uncertain, involving changes in one's subjective state, autonomic responses, and behavior. Defensive and physiologic responses to threats that involve the amygdala and brainstem are conserved across species. While anxiety responses typically serve an adaptive purpose, when excessive, unregulated, and generalized, they can become maladaptive, leading to distress and avoidance of potentially threatening situations. In primates, anxiety can be regulated by the prefrontal cortex (PFC), which has expanded in evolution. This prefrontal expansion is thought to underlie primates' increased capacity to engage high-level regulatory strategies aimed at coping with and modifying the experience of anxiety. The specialized primate lateral, medial, and orbital PFC sectors are connected with association and limbic cortices, the latter of which are connected with the amygdala and brainstem autonomic structures that underlie emotional and physiological arousal. PFC pathways that interface with distinct inhibitory systems within the cortex, the amygdala, or the thalamus can regulate responses by modulating neuronal output. Within the PFC, pathways connecting cortical regions are poised to reduce noise and enhance signals for cognitive operations that regulate anxiety processing and autonomic drive. Specialized PFC pathways to the inhibitory thalamic reticular nucleus suggest a mechanism to allow passage of relevant signals from thalamus to cortex, and in the amygdala to modulate the output to autonomic structures. Disruption of specific nodes within the PFC that interface with inhibitory systems can affect the negative bias, failure to regulate autonomic arousal, and avoidance that characterize anxiety disorders.

Mechanisms of neuroplasticity linking early adversity to depression: developmental considerations

Early exposure to psychosocial adversity is among the most potent predictors of depression. Because depression commonly emerges prior to adulthood, we must consider the fundamental principles of developmental neuroscience when examining how experiences of childhood adversity, including abuse and neglect, can lead to depression. Considering that both the environment and the brain are highly dynamic across the period spanning gestation through adolescence, the purpose of this review is to discuss and integrate stress-based models of depression that center developmental processes. We offer a general framework for understanding how psychosocial adversity in early life disrupts or calibrates the biobehavioral systems implicated in depression. Specifically, we propose that the sources and nature of the environmental input shaping the brain, and the mechanisms of neuroplasticity involved, change across development. We contend that the effects of adversity largely depend on the developmental stage of the organism. First, we summarize leading neurobiological models that focus on the effects of adversity on risk for mental disorders, including depression. In particular, we highlight models of allostatic load, acceleration maturation, dimensions of adversity, and sensitive or critical periods. Second, we expound on and review evidence for the formulation that distinct mechanisms of neuroplasticity are implicated depending on the timing of adverse experiences, and that inherent within certain windows of development are constraints on the sources and nature of these experiences. Finally, we consider other important facets of adverse experiences (e.g., environmental unpredictability, perceptions of one's experiences) before discussing promising research directions for the future of the field.

Adolescence as a pivotal period for emotion regulation development for consideration at current opinion in psychology

Adolescence is a dynamic period for the development of emotion regulation. For many individuals, emotion regulation skills improve dramatically during adolescence; however, for some youth, adolescence marks the beginning or worsening of psychopathology characterized by difficulties with emotion regulation. In the present review, I describe evidence that caregiving experiences play an outsized role in shaping interindividual variability in emotion regulation during adolescence. After describing work demonstrating links between caregiving - with an emphasis on parental socialization practices - and emotion regulation outcomes, I characterize our current understanding of how behavioral and neurobiological indices of emotion regulation develop normatively across adolescence. Using cognitive reappraisal as an exemplar emotion regulation strategy, I outline ways that caregiving might impact interindividual variability in emotion regulation neurodevelopment. I conclude by identifying two key future directions for adolescent emotion regulation research.

Migration-related trauma and mental health among migrant children emigrating from Mexico and Central America to the United States: Effects on developmental neurobiology and implications for policy

Children make up over half of the world's migrants and refugees and face a multitude of traumatic experiences prior to, during, and following migration. Here, we focus on migrant children emigrating from Mexico and Central America to the United States and review trauma related to migration, as well as its implications for the mental health of migrant and refugee children. We then draw upon the early adversity literature to highlight potential behavioral and neurobiological sequalae of migration-related trauma exposure, focusing on attachment, emotion regulation, and fear learning and extinction as transdiagnostic mechanisms underlying the development of internalizing and externalizing symptomatology following early-life adversity. This review underscores the need for interdisciplinary efforts to both mitigate the effects of trauma faced by migrant and refugee youth emigrating from Mexico and Central America and, of primary importance, to prevent child exposure to trauma in the context of migration. Thus, we conclude by outlining policy recommendations aimed at improving the mental health of migrant and refugee youth.

Adolescent anxiety disorders and the developing brain: comparing neuroimaging findings in adolescents and adults

Adolescence is the peak period for the incidence of anxiety disorders. Recent findings have revealed the immaturity of neural networks underlying emotional regulation in this population. Brain vulnerability to anxiety in adolescence is related to the unsynchronised development of anxiety-relevant brain functional systems. However, our current knowledge on brain deficits in adolescent anxiety is mainly borrowed from studies on adults. Understanding adolescent-specific brain deficits is essential for developing biomarkers and brain-based therapies targeting adolescent anxiety. This article reviews and compares recent neuroimaging literature on anxiety-related brain structural and functional deficits between adolescent and adult populations, and proposes a model highlighting the differences between adolescence and adulthood in anxiety-related brain networks. This model emphasises that in adolescence the emotional control system tends to be hypoactivated, the fear conditioning system is immature, and the reward and stress response systems are hypersensitive. Furthermore, the striatum’s functional links to the amygdala and the prefrontal cortex are strengthened, while the link between the prefrontal cortex and the amygdala is weakened in adolescence. This model helps to explain why adolescents are vulnerable to anxiety disorders and provides insights into potential brain-based approaches to intervene in adolescent anxiety disorders.

Emotion Differentiation and Youth Mental Health: Current Understanding and Open Questions

A growing body of research identifies emotion differentiation-the ability to specifically identify one's emotions-as a key skill for well-being. High emotion differentiation is associated with healthier and more effective regulation of one's emotions, and low emotion differentiation has been documented in several forms of psychopathology. However, the lion's share of this research has focused on adult samples, even though approximately 50% of mental disorders onset before age 18. This review curates what we know about the development of emotion differentiation and its implications for youth mental health. I first review published studies investigating how emotion differentiation develops across childhood and adolescence, as well as studies testing relations between emotion differentiation and mental health in youth samples. Emerging evidence suggests that emotion differentiation actually falls across childhood and adolescence, a counterintuitive pattern that merits further investigation. Additionally, several studies find relations between emotion differentiation and youth mental health, but some instability in results emerged. I then identify open questions that limit our current understanding of emotion differentiation, including (i) lack of clarity as to the valid measurement of emotion differentiation, (ii) potential third variables that could explain relations between emotion differentiation and mental-health (e.g., mean negative affect, IQ, personality, and circularity with outcomes), and (iii) lack of clear mechanistic models regarding the development of emotion differentiation and how it facilitates well-being. I conclude with a discussion of future directions that can address open questions and work toward interventions that treat (or even prevent) psychopathology.

Alterations in neural circuits underlying emotion regulation following child maltreatment: a mechanism underlying trauma-related psychopathology

BACKGROUND

Disruptions in neural circuits underlying emotion regulation (ER) may be a mechanism linking child maltreatment with psychopathology. We examined the associations of maltreatment with neural responses during passive viewing of negative emotional stimuli and attempts to modulate emotional responses. We investigated whether the influence of maltreatment on neural activation during ER differed across development and whether alterations in brain function mediated the association between maltreatment and a latent general psychopathology ('p') factor.

METHODS

Youth aged 8-16 years with (n = 79) and without (n = 72) exposure to maltreatment completed an ER task assessing neural responses during passive viewing of negative and neutral images and effortful attempts to regulate emotional responses to negative stimuli. P-factor scores were defined by a bi-factor model encompassing internalizing and externalizing psychopathology.

RESULTS

Maltreated youth had greater activation in left amygdala and salience processing regions and reduced activation in multiple regions involved in cognitive control (bilateral superior frontal gyrus, middle frontal gyrus, and dorsal anterior cingulate cortex) when viewing negative v. neutral images than youth without maltreatment exposure. Reduced neural recruitment in cognitive control regions mediated the association of maltreatment with p-factor in whole-brain analysis. Maltreated youth exhibited increasing recruitment with age in ventrolateral prefrontal cortex during reappraisal while control participants exhibited decreasing recruitment with age. Findings were similar after adjusting for co-occurring neglect.

CONCLUSIONS

Child maltreatment influences the development of regions associated with salience processing and cognitive control during ER in ways that contribute to psychopathology.

Characterizing the Network Architecture of Emotion Regulation Neurodevelopment

The ability to regulate emotions is key to goal attainment and well-being. Although much has been discovered about neurodevelopment and the acquisition of emotion regulation, very little of this work has leveraged information encoded in whole-brain networks. Here we employed a network neuroscience framework to parse the neural underpinnings of emotion regulation skill acquisition, while accounting for age, in a sample of children and adolescents (N = 70, 34 female, aged 8-17 years). Focusing on three key network metrics-network differentiation, modularity, and community number differences between active regulation and a passive emotional baseline-we found that the control network, the default mode network, and limbic network were each related to emotion regulation ability while controlling for age. Greater network differentiation in the control and limbic networks was related to better emotion regulation ability. With regards to network community structure (modularity and community number), more communities and more crosstalk between modules (i.e., less modularity) in the control network were associated with better regulatory ability. By contrast, less crosstalk (i.e., greater modularity) between modules in the default mode network was associated with better regulatory ability. Together, these findings highlight whole-brain connectome features that support the acquisition of emotion regulation in youth.

The prefrontal cortex in a pandemic: Restoring functions with system-, family-, and individual-focused interventions

The COVID-19 pandemic is an unanticipated and uncontrollable chronic stressor that is detrimental to the mental and behavioral health of children and families, particularly those from disadvantaged and marginalized backgrounds. Chronic stress impairs a myriad of prefrontal cortical functions, important for coping with the COVID-19 pandemic, and has consequences on dyadic parent-child functioning. Informed by neuroscience and clinical evidence, sensitive parenting is a vital avenue of intervention that buffers against the toxic effects of COVID-19 on parent-child mental health. In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, we first discuss the neurobiological, psychological, and behavioral mechanisms behind exacerbated mental health risks in families. We then highlight the role of sensitive parenting as a buffer against stress-related mental health problems, and conclude with recommendations for systemic-, family-, and individual-interventions to most effectively address stress-related mental health problems and their impact on children and families during the COVID-19 pandemic. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Parents still matter! Parental warmth predicts adolescent brain function and anxiety and depressive symptoms 2 years later

Anxiety is the most prevalent psychological disorder among youth, and even following treatment, it confers risk for anxiety relapse and the development of depression. Anxiety disorders are associated with heightened response to negative affective stimuli in the brain networks that underlie emotion processing. One factor that can attenuate the symptoms of anxiety and depression in high-risk youth is parental warmth. The current study investigates whether parental warmth helps to protect against future anxiety and depressive symptoms in adolescents with histories of anxiety and whether neural functioning in the brain regions that are implicated in emotion processing and regulation can account for this link. Following treatment for anxiety disorder (Time 1), 30 adolescents (M age = 11.58, SD = 1.26) reported on maternal warmth, and 2 years later (Time 2) they participated in a functional neuroimaging task where they listened to prerecorded criticism and neutral statements from a parent. Higher maternal warmth predicted lower neural activation during criticism, compared with the response during neutral statements, in the left amygdala, bilateral insula, subgenual anterior cingulate (sgACC), right ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, and anterior cingulate cortex. Maternal warmth was associated with adolescents' anxiety and depressive symptoms due to the indirect effects of sgACC activation, suggesting that parenting may attenuate risk for internalizing through its effects on brain function.

Emotion dynamics across adulthood in everyday life: Older adults are more emotionally stable and better at regulating desires

Older adults report experiencing improved emotional health, such as more intense positive affect and less intense negative affect. However, there are mixed findings on whether older adults are better at regulating emotion-a hallmark feature of emotional health-and most research is based on laboratory studies that may not capture how people regulate their emotions in everyday life. We used experience sampling to examine how multiple measures of emotional health, including mean affect, dynamic fluctuations between affective states and the ability to resist desires-a common form of emotion regulation-differ in daily life across adulthood. Participants (N = 122, ages 20-80) reported how they were feeling and responding to desire temptations for 10 days. Older adults experienced more intense positive affect, less intense negative affect, and were more emotionally stable, even after controlling for individual differences in global life satisfaction. Older adults were more successful at regulating desires, even though they experienced more intense desires than younger adults. In addition, adults in general experiencing more intense affect were less successful at resisting desires. These results demonstrate how emotional experience is related to more successful desire regulation in everyday life and provide unique evidence that emotional health and regulation improve with age. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Stress-elicited neural activity in young adults varies with childhood sexual abuse

OBJECTIVE

Childhood physical and sexual abuse are stressful experiences that may alter the emotional response to future stressors. Stress-related emotional function is supported by brain regions that include the prefrontal cortex (PFC), hippocampus, and amygdala. The present study investigated whether childhood physical and sexual abuse are associated with stress-elicited brain activity in young adulthood.

METHODS

Participants (N = 300; Mage = 20.0; 151 female) completed a psychosocial stress task during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Measures of physical and sexual abuse were included in a linear mixed effects model to estimate the unique relationship each type of childhood abuse had with stress-elicited brain activity.

RESULTS

Stress-elicited dorsolateral PFC, ventromedial PFC, and hippocampal activity decreased as the frequency of childhood sexual abuse increased. There were no regions in which stress-elicited activation varied with physical abuse.

CONCLUSIONS

The present findings suggest there is a unique relationship between childhood sexual abuse and the stress-elicited PFC and hippocampal activity of young adults that is not observed following childhood physical abuse.

SIGNIFICANCE

These findings may have important implications for understanding the mechanisms by which childhood sexual abuse impacts the development of future psychopathology.

Exploring valence bias as a metric for frontoamygdalar connectivity and depressive symptoms in childhood

Negativity bias is a core feature of depression that is associated with dysfunctional frontoamygdalar connectivity; this pathway is associated with emotion regulation and sensitive to neurobiological change during puberty. We used a valence bias task (ratings of emotional ambiguity) as a potential early indicator of depression risk and differences in frontoamygdalar connectivity. Previous work using this task demonstrated that children normatively have a negative bias that attenuates with maturation. Here, we test the hypothesis that persistence of this negativity bias as maturation ensues may reveal differences in emotion regulation development, and may be associated with increased risk for depression. In children aged 6-13 years, we tested the moderating role of puberty on relationships between valence bias, depressive symptoms, and frontoamygdalar connectivity. A negative bias was associated with increased depressive symptoms for those at more advanced pubertal stages (within this sample) and less regulatory frontoamygdalar connectivity, whereas a more positive bias was associated with more regulatory connectivity patterns. These data suggest that with maturation, individual differences in positivity biases and associated emotion regulation circuitry confer a differential risk for depression. Longitudinal work is necessary to determine the directionality of these effects and explore the influence of early life events.

The VLPFC versus the DLPFC in Downregulating Social Pain Using Reappraisal and Distraction Strategies

The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and ventrolateral PFC (VLPFC) are both crucial structures involved in voluntary emotional regulation. However, it remains unclear whether the functions of these two cortical regions that are involved in emotional regulation, which are usually active in non-social situations, could be generalized to the regulation of social pain as well.

The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and ventrolateral PFC (VLPFC) are both crucial structures involved in voluntary emotional regulation. However, it remains unclear whether the functions of these two cortical regions that are involved in emotional regulation, which are usually active in non-social situations, could be generalized to the regulation of social pain as well. This study employed transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to examine the causal relationship between the DLPFC/VLPFC and the emotional regulation of social pain via distraction and reappraisal. Ninety human participants (45 males and 45 females) initially underwent either active (DLPFC/VLPFC, n = 30/30) or sham (vertex, n = 30) TMS sessions. Participants were then instructed to use both distraction and reappraisal strategies to downregulate any negative emotions evoked by social exclusion pictures. Convergent results of the subjective emotional rating and electrophysiological indices demonstrated that: (1) both the DLPFC and VLPFC highly facilitate the downregulation of affective responses caused by social exclusion, revealing a causal role of these lateral PFCs in voluntary emotional regulation of both non-social and social pain; and (2) these two cortical regions showed relative functional specificity for distraction (DLPFC) and reappraisal (VLPFC) strategies, which helps to refine the cortical targeting of therapeutic protocols. In addition, the TMS effect was sustainable for at least 1 h, showcasing the potential feasibility of using this method in clinical practice. Together, these findings provide cognitive and neural evidence for the targeting of the VLPFC and/or the DLPFC to improve emotional regulation abilities, especially in social contexts.

SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT This study aimed to examine the role of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and ventrolateral PFC (VLPFC) in emotional regulation, particularly in response to social pain through the use of distraction and reappraisal strategies, as this is a relatively underexplored area of inquiry. This study makes a significant contribution to the literature because our results provide novel empirical information on the role of these cortical structures in the processing of negative emotions elicited within certain social contexts. As such, our findings have potential clinical implications, paving the way for future clinicians to be able to accurately target specific brain regions among patients struggling with impaired social cognition abilities, including those diagnosed with posttraumatic stress disorder, autism spectrum disorder, social anxiety disorder, and depression.

A dynamic causal model on self-regulation of aversive emotion

Cognitive regulation of emotion has been proven to be effective to take control the emotional responses. Some cognitive models have also been proposed to explain the neural mechanism that underlies this process. However, some characteristics of the models are still unclear, such as whether the cognitive regulation will be spontaneously employed by participants implicitly. The present study recruited the fMRI experiment to focus on the discomfort induced by viewing aversive pictures, and the emotional self-regulation during picture viewing. By using the dynamic causal modeling (DCM), 50 putative models of brain functional networks were constructed, one optimal model that fitted the real data best won the comparison from the candidates. As a result, the optimal model suggests that both the ventral striatum (VS)-centric bottom-up and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC)-centric top-down regulations are recruited for self-regulation on negative emotions. The DLPFC will exert modulatory influence on the VS only when the VS fails to suppress the induced emotions by self-inhibition.

An exploration of amygdala-prefrontal mechanisms in the intergenerational transmission of learned fear

Humans learn about their environments by observing others, including what to fear and what to trust. Observational fear learning may be especially important early in life when children turn to their parents to gather information about their world. Yet, the vast majority of empirical research on fear learning in youth has thus far focused on firsthand classical conditioning, which may fail to capture one of the primary means by which fears are acquired during development. To address this gap in the literature, the present study examined observational fear learning in youth (n = 33; age range: 6-17 years) as they watched videos of their parent and an "unfamiliar parent" (i.e., another participant's parent) undergo fear conditioning. Youth demonstrated stronger fear learning when observing their parent compared to an unfamiliar parent, as indicated by changes in their self-reported liking of the stimuli to which their parents were conditioned (CS+, a geometric shape paired with an aversive noise; CS-, a geometric shape never paired with an aversive noise) and amygdala responses. Parent trait anxiety was associated with youth learning better (i.e., reporting a stronger preference for the CS- relative to CS+), and exhibiting stronger medial prefrontal-amygdala connectivity. Neuroimaging data were additionally acquired from a subset of parents during firsthand conditioning, and parental amygdala and mPFC activation were associated with youth's neural recruitment. Together, these results suggest that youth preferentially learn fears via observation of their parents, and this learning is associated with emotional traits and neural recruitment in parents.

Anxiety and Stress Alter Decision-Making Dynamics and Causal Amygdala-Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex Circuits During Emotion Regulation in Children

BACKGROUND

Anxiety and stress reactivity are risk factors for the development of affective disorders. However, the behavioral and neurocircuit mechanisms that potentiate maladaptive emotion regulation are poorly understood. Neuroimaging studies have implicated the amygdala and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) in emotion regulation, but how anxiety and stress alter their context-specific causal circuit interactions is not known. Here, we use computational modeling to inform affective pathophysiology, etiology, and neurocircuit targets for early intervention.

METHODS

Forty-five children (10-11 years of age; 25 boys) reappraised aversive stimuli during functional magnetic resonance imaging scanning. Clinical measures of anxiety and stress were acquired for each child. Drift-diffusion modeling of behavioral data and causal circuit analysis of functional magnetic resonance imaging data, with a National Institute of Mental Health Research Domain Criteria approach, were used to characterize latent behavioral and neurocircuit decision-making dynamics driving emotion regulation.

RESULTS

Children successfully reappraised negative responses to aversive stimuli. Drift-diffusion modeling revealed that emotion regulation was characterized by increased initial bias toward positive reactivity during viewing of aversive stimuli and increased drift rate, which captured evidence accumulation during emotion evaluation. Crucially, anxiety and stress reactivity impaired latent behavioral dynamics associated with reappraisal and decision making. Anxiety and stress increased dynamic casual influences from the right amygdala to DLPFC. In contrast, DLPFC, but not amygdala, reactivity was correlated with evidence accumulation and decision making during emotion reappraisal.

CONCLUSIONS

Our findings provide new insights into how anxiety and stress in children impact decision making and amygdala-DLPFC signaling during emotion regulation, and uncover latent behavioral and neurocircuit mechanisms of early risk for psychopathology.

Neural and behavioral signatures of social evaluation and adaptation in childhood and adolescence: The Leiden consortium on individual development (L-CID)

The transition period between early childhood and late adolescence is characterized by pronounced changes in social competence, or the capacity for flexible social adaptation. Here, we propose that two processes, self-control and prosociality, are crucial for social adaptation following social evaluation. We present a neurobehavioral model showing commonalities in neural responses to experiences of social acceptance and rejection, and multiple pathways for responding to social context. The Leiden Consortium on Individual Development (L-CID) provides a comprehensive approach towards understanding the longitudinal developmental pathways of, and social enrichment effects on, social competence, taking into account potential differential effects of such enrichment. Using Neurosynth based brain maps we point towards the medial prefrontal cortex as an important region integrating social cognition, self-referential processing and self-control for learning to respond flexibly to changing social contexts. Based on their role in social evaluation processing, we suggest to examine medial prefrontal cortex connections with lateral prefrontal cortex and the ventral striatum as potential neural differential susceptibility markers, in addition to previously established markers of differential susceptibility.

Spontaneous microstates related to effects of low socioeconomic status on neuroticism

Individuals with high neuroticism had the decreased control functions of anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) over amygdala (emotion regions) and low socioeconomic status (SES) had negative effects on the functions of ACC. Based on these, we hypothesized that the decreased functions of ACC might make individuals with low SES had high level of neuroticism. According to the score of objective SES (OSES) and subjective SES (SSES) scales, subjects were divided into four groups (low SSES, high SSES, low OSES and high OSES) to investigate the roles of dynamic characteristics related to the ACC in the relationships between SES and neuroticism using resting-state EEG (RS-EEG) microstates analysis. It had been found that RS-EEG microstates can be divided into four types (MS1, MS2, MS3 and MS4) and the MS3 was related cingulo-opercular brain networks (including ACC and anterior insular). As our prediction, SSES had direct effects on neuroticism relative to OSES. Moreover, the neuroticism for low SSES was positively related to the occurrence and contribution of MS3, as well as the possibilities of transitions between MS3 and MS1. Based on these, we thought that low-SSES individuals might be more difficult to inhibit the negative emotions, especially inhibit the spontaneous thoughts related to these emotions.

No Words for Feelings? Not Only for My Own: Diminished Emotional Empathic Ability in Alexithymia

The present study has been designed to disentangle cognitive and emotional dimensions of empathy in a group of mentally healthy and highly alexithymic individuals (ALEX, n = 24) and well-matched controls (n = 26) through questionnaire Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI) and Multifaceted Empathy Task (MET) used during the fMRI and after the fMRI. Simultaneously, Skin Conductance Response (SCR) has been acquired as an implicit measure of emotional reaction. Results show an impaired emotional empathic ability in alexithymic individuals, with lower levels of SCR and higher activation in prefrontal brain regions such as the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC) and inferior frontal gyrus (IFG). Cognitive empathy was not impaired in the alexithymic group and the results were accompanied by a higher activation left IFG. The study leads to the conclusion that alexithymia does not only involve a diminished ability to identify and describe one's own emotions. Furthermore, it is related to a deeper disability of emotion regulation, which becomes visible through impaired emotional concern for others and higher levels of personal distress.

Prefrontal-amygdala connectivity in trait anxiety and generalized anxiety disorder: Testing the boundaries between healthy and pathological worries

BACKGROUND

Current brain-based theoretical models of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) suggest a dysfunction of amygdala-ventromedial prefrontal cortex emotional regulatory mechanisms. These alterations might be reflected by an altered resting state functional connectivity between both areas and could extend to vulnerable non-clinical samples such as high worriers without a GAD diagnosis. However, there is a lack of information in this regard.

METHODS

We investigated differences in resting state functional connectivity between the basolateral amygdala and the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (amygdala-vmPFC) in 28 unmedicated participants with GAD, 28 high-worriers and 28 low-worriers. We additionally explored selected clinical variables as predictors of amygdala-vmPFC connectivity, including anxiety sensitivity.

RESULTS

GAD participants presented higher left amygdala-vmPFC connectivity compared to both groups of non-GAD participants, and there were no differences between the latter two groups. In our exploratory analyses, concerns about the cognitive consequences of anxiety (the cognitive dimension of anxiety sensitivity) were found to be a significant predictor of the left amygdala-vmPFC connectivity.

LIMITATIONS

The cross-sectional nature of our study preclude us from assessing if functional connectivity measures and anxiety sensitivity scores entail an increased risk of GAD.

CONCLUSIONS

These results suggest a neurobiological qualitative distinction at the level of the amygdala-vmPFC emotional-regulatory system in GAD compared to non-GAD participants, either high- or low-worriers. At this neural level, they question previous hypotheses of continuity between high worries and GAD development. Instead, other anxiety traits such as anxiety sensitivity might confer a greater proneness to the amygdala-vmPFC connectivity alterations observed in GAD.

Reliability and validity of a temporal distancing emotion regulation task in adolescence

Adopting a temporally distant perspective on stressors, also known as using a temporal distancing emotion regulation strategy, can alleviate distress. Young adults’ ability to adopt a temporal distancing strategy has previously been measured using an experimental temporal distancing task (Ahmed, Somerville, & Sebastian, 2018). In the current study, we evaluate the psychometric properties of this task in younger (N = 345, aged 10–11) and older (N = 99, aged 18–21) adolescents and explore developmental differences in the ability to use temporal distancing to alleviate distress. Participants listened to scenarios and rated negative affect when adopting a distant-future perspective, a near-future perspective, or when reacting naturally. We evaluated the test–retest reliability of the measure in older adolescents and its construct validity in both younger and older adolescents by assessing correlations with self-report measures of emotion regulation strategy use. Our findings broadly replicated those of Ahmed et al. (2018): Adopting distant- and near-future perspectives produced significantly lower self-reported distress relative to reacting naturally, with the distant-future strategy producing the least distress. Older adolescents alleviated their distress more effectively than younger adolescents and reported projecting further into the future. Regulation success scores on the temporal distancing task showed adequate test–retest reliability. However, these scores did not correlate with self-reported habitual use of temporal distancing or reappraisal strategies generally. These findings suggest that the ability to use a temporal distancing strategy for emotion regulation improves during adolescence, but that ability may not be related to habitual use of this strategy.

Readiness for Medical School: a Radical Proposal

Readiness for medical school, like readiness for reading, includes physiological, psychological, educational, and sociological aspects of growth. Full cognitive and neurodevelopment including higher levels of adult thought order occur generally towards the ends of the third decade. Earlier patient care experiences and an understanding of the social and structural determinants of health demand some experiences in the world. We believe a requirement to prove medical school readiness should be to hold a job for a year that interfaces with the public and proves responsibility, reliability, and accountability as documented by a supervisor.

A review of associations between parental emotion socialization behaviors and the neural substrates of emotional reactivity and regulation in youth

As highlighted by Eisenberg, Cumberland, and Spinrad (1998), parents play a critical role in children's socioemotional development, in part, by shaping how children and adolescents process, respond to, and regulate their emotions (i.e., emotional reactivity/regulation). Although evidence for associations between parenting behavior and youth's emotional processing has relied primarily on behavioral measures of emotion, researchers have begun to examine how parenting is related to the neural substrates of youth's reactivity and regulation. This article reviews a growing literature linking parental behavior with structural brain development as well as functional activity and connectivity in neural regions supporting emotional reactivity/regulation during infancy, childhood, and adolescence. By focusing on normative parental behaviors, we evaluate the evidence for associations between typical variations in caregiving and neural processes thought to support youth's emotional reactivity/regulation. The purpose of this review is to (1) extend the model put forth by Eisenberg and colleagues to consider the ways that parenting behaviors are related to neural substrates of youth's emotional reactivity and regulation; (2) review the empirical evidence for associations between parenting, particularly parental "emotion-related socialization behaviors" (ERSBs), and neural substrates of youth's emotional reactivity/regulation; and (3) recommend future directions for this emerging area of research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).

Early Adversity and the Neotenous Human Brain

Human brain development is optimized to learn from environmental cues. The protracted development of the cortex and its connections with subcortical targets has been argued to permit more opportunity for acquiring complex behaviors. This review uses the example of amygdala-medial prefrontal cortex circuitry development to illustrate a principle of human development-namely, that the extension of the brain's developmental timeline allows for the (species-expected) collaboration between child and parent in co-construction of the human brain. The neurobiology underlying affective learning capitalizes on this protracted timeline to develop a rich affective repertoire in adulthood. Humans are afforded this luxuriously slow development in part by the extended period of caregiving provided by parents, and parents aid in scaffolding the process of maturation during childhood. Just as adequate caregiving is a potent effector of brain development, so is adverse caregiving, which is the largest environmental risk factor for adult mental illness. There are large individual differences in neurobiological outcomes following caregiving adversity, indicating that these pathways are probabilistic, rather than deterministic, and prolonged plasticity in human brain development may also allow for subsequent amelioration by positive experiences. The extant research indicates that the development of mental health cannot be considered without consideration of children in the context of their families.

Early Childhood Parenting Predicts Late Childhood Brain Functional Connectivity During Emotion Perception and Reward Processing

Seventy-nine 3-year olds and their mothers participated in a laboratory-based task to assess maternal hostility. Mothers also reported their behavioral regulation of their child. Seven years later, functional magnetic resonance imaging data were acquired while viewing emotional faces and completing a reward processing task. Maternal hostility predicted more negative amygdala connectivity during exposure to sad relative to neutral faces with frontal and parietal regions as well as more negative left ventral striatal connectivity during monetary gain relative to loss feedback with the right posterior orbital frontal cortex and right inferior frontal gyrus. In contrast, maternal regulation predicted enhanced cingulo-frontal connectivity during monetary gain relative to loss feedback. Results suggest parenting is associated with alterations in emotion and reward processing circuitry 7-8 years later.

Multivariate Patterns of Posterior Cortical Activity Differentiate Forms of Emotional Distancing

Distancing is an effective tactic for emotion regulation, which can take several forms depending on the type(s) of psychological distance being manipulated to modify affect. We recently proposed a neurocognitive model of emotional distancing, but it is unknown how its specific forms are instantiated in the brain. Here, we presented healthy young adults (N = 34) with aversive pictures during functional magnetic resonance imaging to directly compare behavioral performance and brain activity across spatial, temporal, and objective forms of distancing. We found emotion regulation performance to be largely comparable across these forms. A conjunction analysis of activity associated with these forms yielded a high degree of overlap, encompassing regions of the default mode and frontoparietal networks as predicted by our model. A multivariate pattern classification further revealed distributed patches of posterior cortical activation that discriminated each form from one another. These findings not only confirm aspects of our overarching model but also elucidate a novel role for cortical regions in and around the parietal lobe in selectively supporting spatial, temporal, and social cognitive processes to distance oneself from an emotional encounter. These regions may provide new targets for brain-based interventions for emotion dysregulation.