M4. CHILDHOOD TRAUMA, BRAIN STRUCTURE AND EMOTION RECOGNITION IN SCHIZOPHRENIA AND HEALTHY ADULTS: A MODERATED MEDIATION ANALYSIS

Abstract Background While traumatic childhood experiences have been frequently associated with adverse effects on social cognitive abilities, specifically emotion recognition, in individuals with schizophrenia (SZ) and to some degree in healthy adults also (Rokita et al., 2018), the neural mechanisms for this association remain unclear. Therefore, the main aim of this study was to explore the impact of childhood trauma on brain structures that are particularly sensitive to stress and are involved in emotion recognition processes (i.e. amygdala, hippocampus, anterior cingulate cortex (ACC)) (Cancel et al., 2019). We also investigated whether volumetric changes in these brain regions mediate the association between childhood trauma and performance on an emotion recognition task. Methods We investigated 46 patients with SZ (mean age=43.74; SD=10.94; 12 females and 34 males) and 112 healthy adults (mean age=40.13; SD=12.46; 31 females and 81 males). All participants underwent an MRI scan and completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ) (Bernstein et al., 2003), which assesses the experience of trauma in childhood, including emotional abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional neglect and physical neglect. Emotion recognition was measured with the total score on the Emotion Recognition Task (ERT) implemented in the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB) (Robbins et al., 1994). Mediation analyses were conducted to explore the direct and indirect effects of childhood trauma on emotion recognition via volumetric changes in the amygdala, hippocampus and the ACC as mediators. Results We found that patients with SZ had significantly higher scores on physical neglect (PN; p=.018) and cumulative childhood trauma (p=.049) compared to healthy participants. Patients also had significantly smaller hippocampus (p=.001), but not amygdala (p=.453) or ACC (p=.893), and performed worse on the ERT task (p<.001), compared to the healthy group. PN was significantly negatively associated with the total score on the ERT task (r=-.321, p<.001) and a smaller volume of the left ACC (r=-.161, p=.046) in all participants. Reduced volumes of the left and entire ACC appeared to mediate the association between PN and ERT task in healthy adults (β=-1.183, SE=.687, 95% [-2.701: -.079]; β=-1.176, SE=.738, 95% [-2.872: -.0162], respectively). In the patient group, only the direct association between PN and the ERT score was significant (β= -11.657, SE=3.843, 95% CI [-19.251: -4.064], p=.003). Discussion Our findings provide further evidence for the detrimental impact of childhood trauma, specifically physical neglect, on volumetric changes in the ACC region in both patients with SZ and healthy adults. Moreover, to the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to show that the ACC region may be a potential neural mediator in the association between physical neglect and the ability to recognise emotions. These findings highlight the need to develop early interventions (e.g. parenting programs) in order to minimise the occurrence of childhood adversities, hence preventing from their detrimental effects on brain structure and function in both clinical and non-clinical populations.

Download Full-text

Childhood trauma, brain structure and emotion recognition in patients with schizophrenia and healthy participants

Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience ◽

10.1093/scan/nsaa160 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 15 (12) ◽

pp. 1336-1350

Author(s):

Karolina I Rokita ◽

Laurena Holleran ◽

Maria R Dauvermann ◽

David Mothersill ◽

Jessica Holland ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Emotion Recognition ◽

Childhood Trauma ◽

Brain Structure ◽

Clinical Sample ◽

Recognition Task ◽

Anterior Cingulate ◽

Early Life Adversity ◽

Brain Structure And Function ◽

Physical Neglect ◽

Healthy Participants

Abstract Childhood trauma, and in particular physical neglect, has been repeatedly associated with lower performance on measures of social cognition (e.g. emotion recognition tasks) in both psychiatric and non-clinical populations. The neural mechanisms underpinning this association have remained unclear. Here, we investigated whether volumetric changes in three stress-sensitive regions—the amygdala, hippocampus and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC)—mediate the association between childhood trauma and emotion recognition in a healthy participant sample (N = 112) and a clinical sample of patients with schizophrenia (N = 46). Direct effects of childhood trauma, specifically physical neglect, on Emotion Recognition Task were observed in the whole sample. In healthy participants, reduced total and left ACC volumes were observed to fully mediate the association between both physical neglect and total childhood trauma score, and emotion recognition. No mediating effects of the hippocampus and amygdala volumes were observed for either group. These results suggest that reduced ACC volume may represent part of the mechanism by which early life adversity results in poorer social cognitive function. Confirmation of the causal basis of this association would highlight the importance of resilience-building interventions to mitigate the detrimental effects of childhood trauma on brain structure and function.

Download Full-text

The association between childhood trauma and facial emotion recognition in patients with stable schizophrenia

European Psychiatry ◽

10.1016/j.eurpsy.2016.01.1334 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 33 (S1) ◽

pp. S372-S372 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

J. Mrizak ◽

A. Arous ◽

R. Trabelsi ◽

A. Aissa ◽

H. Ben Ammar ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Sexual Abuse ◽

Emotion Recognition ◽

Childhood Trauma ◽

Emotional Abuse ◽

Facial Emotion Recognition ◽

Facial Emotion ◽

Significant Feature ◽

Childhood Trauma Questionnaire ◽

Physical Neglect ◽

Competing Interest

IntroductionThe impairment of facial emotion recognition (FER) among patients with schizophrenia (SCZ) is a significant feature of the illness. Childhood trauma (CT) is reported with a high prevalence in SCZ and is considered one of its risk factors.ObjectivesTo investigate the relationship between FER and CT in SCZ.MethodsFifty-eight outpatients with stable SCZ completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire retrospectively assessing five types of childhood trauma (emotional, physical and sexual abuse, and emotional and physical neglect). They also completed a newly developed and validated FER task constructed from photographs of the face of a famous Tunisian actress and evaluating the ability to correctly identify Ekman's six basic facial emotions (happiness, sadness, anger, disgust, fear and surprise).ResultsPatients with higher scores of CT performed significantly worse in FER task. Our results suggest that the presence of sexual abuse is specifically correlated to a poor identification of anger (P = 0.02) and disgust (P = 0.03) while the presence of emotional abuse and physical neglect are correlated to a poor identification of happiness and sadness.ConclusionsCT may represent one of the causes of the FER deficits in schizophrenia. Further studies are necessary to confirm the link between specific kinds of childhood trauma and deficits in the recognition of discrete emotions.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.

Download Full-text

Error-Monitoring is Modulated by School Pedagogy

10.31219/osf.io/7nbqz ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Solange Denervaud ◽

Jean-François Knebel ◽

Emeline Mullier ◽

Patric Hagmann ◽

Micah M. Murray

Keyword(s):

Fluid Intelligence ◽

Recognition Task ◽

Event Related Potentials ◽

Anterior Cingulate ◽

Error Monitoring ◽

Traditional Curriculum ◽

Source Estimation ◽

Related Potentials ◽

School Pedagogy ◽

The Impact

Within an inherently dynamic environment, unexpected outcomes are part of daily life. Performance monitoring allows us to detect these events and adjust behavior accordingly. The necessity of such an optimal functioning has made error-monitoring a prominent topic of research over the last decades. Event-related potentials (ERPs) have differentiated between two brain components involved in error-monitoring: the error-related negativity (ERN) and error-related positivity (Pe) that are thought to reflect detection vs. emotional/motivational processing of errors, respectively. Both ERN and Pe depend on the protracted maturation of the frontal cortices and anterior cingulate through adolescence. To our knowledge, the impact of schooling pedagogy on error-monitoring and its brain mechanisms remains unknown and was the focus of the present study. Swiss schoolchildren completed a continuous recognition task while 64-channel EEG was recorded and later analyzed within an electrical neuroimaging framework. They were enrolled either in a Montessori curriculum (N=13), consisting of self-directed learning through trial-and-error activities with sensory materials, or a traditional curriculum (N=14), focused on externally driven activities mainly based on reward feedback. The two groups were controlled for age, gender, socio-economic status, parental educational style, and scores of fluid intelligence. The ERN was significantly enhanced in Montessori schoolchildren (driven by a larger response to errors), with source estimation differences localized to the cuneus and precuneus. In contrast, the Pe was enhanced in traditional schoolchildren (driven by a larger response to correct trials), with source estimation differences localized to the ventral anterior cingulate. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis demonstrated that the ERN and Pe could reliably classify if a child was following a Montessori or traditional curriculum. Brain activity subserving error-monitoring is modulated differently according to school pedagogy.

Download Full-text

Association between schizoid tendencies and aggressive behaviors: mediating and moderating influences in childhood trauma and life events among Chinese adolescents

Annals of General Psychiatry ◽

10.1186/s12991-021-00371-1 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 20 (1) ◽

Author(s):

Tingyu Yang ◽

Yuqiong He ◽

Shuxian Wu ◽

Xilong Cui ◽

Xuerong Luo ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Sexual Abuse ◽

Life Events ◽

Childhood Trauma ◽

Emotional Abuse ◽

Child Behavior Checklist ◽

Short Form ◽

Chinese Adolescents ◽

Emotional Neglect ◽

Aggressive Behaviors ◽

Physical Neglect

Abstract Background This study investigated an association between schizoid tendencies and aggressive behaviors in Chinese adolescents, and explored the underlying mechanism. Methods The data of 3094 adolescents aged 12 to 16 years were collected from an epidemiological survey in China. All the subjects or their parents completed the Achenbach’s Child Behavior Checklist, the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire-Short Form, and the Adolescent Self-rating Life Event Checklist (ASLEC). Results Relative to the non-schizoid group, adolescents with schizoid tendencies (male or female) showed significantly higher scores for aggressive behaviors, emotional abuse, and ASLEC. Regarding females only, those with schizoid tendencies had significantly higher (lower) scores for physical abuse and emotional neglect (physical neglect). The aggressive behaviors score was predicted by scores for schizoid tendencies (βmale = 0.620, βfemale = 0.638, both P < 0.001) and ASLEC (βmale = 0.125, βfemale = 0.061, both P < 0.01), and by childhood trauma score (males: emotional neglect [β = 0.045, P = 0.021]; females: emotional abuse and sexual abuse [β = 0.118 and − 0.062, both P < 0.01]). The ASLEC and childhood trauma scores mediated the association between scores for schizoid tendencies and aggressive behaviors, specifically, emotional neglect (emotional abuse and sexual abuse) in males (females). In females, the interaction between scores for childhood trauma and ASLEC affected the aggressive behaviors score (P = 0.023). Conclusions Schizoid tendencies are associated with aggressive behaviors among Chinese adolescents. Recent life events and childhood trauma mediated an association between schizoid tendencies and aggressive behaviors. The interaction between childhood trauma and recent life events affected aggressive behaviors in females. Aggressive behaviors in adolescents may be ameliorated by reducing childhood trauma and life events.

Download Full-text

The role of social support in the association between childhood trauma and depression among HIV-infected and HIV-uninfected individuals

International Journal of STD & AIDS ◽

10.1177/0956462418793736 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 30 (1) ◽

pp. 29-36 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Violeta J Rodriguez ◽

Stefani A Butts ◽

Lissa N Mandell ◽

Stephen M Weiss ◽

Mahendra Kumar ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Social Support ◽

Hiv Infection ◽

Childhood Trauma ◽

Ethnically Diverse ◽

Sociodemographic Characteristics ◽

Physical Neglect ◽

Trauma Ct ◽

Living With Hiv ◽

The Impact

Childhood trauma (CT) – emotional, physical or sexual abuse, or emotional or physical neglect – has been associated with HIV infection and can lead to poor health outcomes and depression in adulthood. Though the impact of CT on depression may be decreased by social support, this may not be true of individuals living with HIV, due to the additive traumatic effects of both CT and acquisition of HIV. This study examined social support, depression, and CT among HIV-infected (n = 134) and HIV-uninfected (n = 306) men and women. Participants (N = 440) were assessed regarding sociodemographic characteristics, CT, depression, and social support. Participants were racially and ethnically diverse, 36 ± 9 years of age on average, and 44% had an income of less than USD$500 a month. Among HIV-uninfected individuals, social support explained the association between depression in persons with CT ( b = 0.082, bCI [0.044, 0.130]). Among HIV-infected individuals, after accounting for sociodemographic characteristics, social support did not explain the association between depression and CT due to lower levels of social support among HIV-infected individuals [95% CI: −0.006, 0.265]. The quality of social support may differ among HIV-infected persons due to decreased social support and smaller social networks among those living with HIV. Depressive symptoms among those living with HIV appear to be less influenced by social support, likely due to the additive effects of HIV infection combined with CT.

Download Full-text

Multimodal emotion perception in young and elderly patients with multiple sclerosis

10.31234/osf.io/n47cg ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Maxime Montembeault ◽

Estefania Brando ◽

Kim Charest ◽

Alexandra Tremblay ◽

Élaine Roger ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Emotion Recognition ◽

Real Life ◽

Emotion Perception ◽

Recognition Task ◽

Self Report ◽

Self Monitoring ◽

Facial Emotions ◽

Multimodal Emotion Recognition ◽

The Impact ◽

Better Than

Background. Studies suggest that emotion recognition and empathy are impaired in patients with MS (pwMS). Nonetheless, most studies of emotion recognition have used facial stimuli, are restricted to young samples, and rely self-report assessments of empathy. The aims of this study are to determine the impact of MS and age on multimodal emotion recognition (facial emotions and vocal emotional bursts) and on socioemotional sensitivity (as reported by the participants and their informants). We also aim to investigate the associations between emotion recognition, socioemotional sensitivity, and cognitive measures. Methods. We recruited 13 young healthy controls (HC), 14 young pwMS, 14 elderly HC and 15 elderly pwMS. They underwent a short neuropsychological battery, an experimental emotion recognition task including facial emotions and vocal emotional bursts. Both participants and their study informants completed the Revised-Self Monitoring Scale (RSMS) to assess the participant’s socioemotional sensitivity. Results. There was a significant effect of age and group on recognition of both facial emotions and emotional vocal bursts, HC performing significantly better than pwMS, and young participants performing better than elderly participants (no interaction effect). The same effects were observed on self-reported socioemotional sensitivity. However, lower socioemotional sensitivity in pwMS was not reported by the informants. Finally, multimodal emotion recognition did not correlate with socioemotional sensitivity, but it correlated with global cognitive severity. Conclusion. PwMS present with multimodal emotion perception deficits. Our results extend previous findings of decreased emotion perception and empathy to a group of elderly pwMS, in which advancing age does not accentuate these deficits. However, the decreased socioemotional sensitivity reported by pwMS does not appear to be observed by their relatives, nor to correlate with their emotion perception impairments. Future studies should investigate the real-life impacts of emotion perception deficits in pwMS.

Download Full-text

Evaluation of self-esteem and childhood trauma in patients with sexual disorders

European Psychiatry ◽

10.1016/j.eurpsy.2017.01.1694 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 41 (S1) ◽

pp. s852-s853

Author(s):

G. Teksin Unal ◽

O. Sahmelikoglu Onur ◽

C. Karsidag ◽

M.G. Teksin Bakir

Keyword(s):

Childhood Trauma ◽

Interpersonal Relationships ◽

Emotional Abuse ◽

Premature Ejaculation ◽

Self Esteem ◽

Depressive Mood ◽

Sexual Disorders ◽

Emotional Neglect ◽

Childhood Trauma Questionnaire ◽

Physical Neglect

IntroductionSexual dysfunction (SD) is defined as the deterioration of sexual response cycles caused by anatomic, physiologic or psychologic reasons.ObjectivesWe believe that SD is closely related to self-esteem and childhood trauma (CT).AimIn this study, the level of self-esteem and CT in patients diagnosed with SD vs. controls are aimed to be compared. In addition, relationship between complaints of SD self-esteem and CT variable subgroups are planned to be investigated.MethodTwenty-four patients visited Prof. Dr. Mazhar Osman Psychiatric Hospital with matching defined criteria and 24 control counterparts statistically matching were taken sociodemographic data form, Rosenberg Self-esteem Scale (RSS) and Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ-28) was applied.ResultsCTQ-28 averages and RSS variables which are sensitivity to criticism, depressive mood, psychosomatic symptoms, feeling threatened in interpersonal relationships, degree to participate in discussions, relationship with father were higher in patients with SD (P < 0.05). Considering the relationship between complaints of SD and CTQ-28 subscales, physical abuse, emotional abuse, physical neglect, emotional neglect averages of patients were observed significantly different rooted by genitopelvic pain/penetration disorder and premature ejaculation and in emotional neglect by premature ejaculation and low libido combination (P < 0.05).ConclusionsIn literature, there are many studies that show CT leads to SD and several studies state that self-esteem is affected in patients with SD [1]. CT must be considered and determined in the goal of treatment of SD.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.

Download Full-text

The Impact of Retrospective Childhood Maltreatment on Eating Disorders as Mediated by Food Addiction: A Cross-Sectional Study

Nutrients ◽

10.3390/nu12102969 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 12 (10) ◽

pp. 2969 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Rami Bou Khalil ◽

Ghassan Sleilaty ◽

Sami Richa ◽

Maude Seneque ◽

Sylvain Iceta ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Eating Disorders ◽

Eating Disorder ◽

Childhood Maltreatment ◽

Emotional Abuse ◽

Food Addiction ◽

Cross Sectional Study ◽

Cross Sectional ◽

Yale Food Addiction Scale ◽

Physical Neglect ◽

The Impact

Background: The current study aimed to test whether food addiction (FA) might mediate the relationship between the presence of a history of childhood maltreatment and eating disorder (ED) symptom severity. Methods: Participants were 231 patients with ED presenting between May 2017 and January 2020 to a daycare treatment facility for assessment and management with mainly the Eating Disorder Inventory-2 (EDI-2), the Child Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ), and the Yale Food Addiction Scale (YFAS 2.0). Results: Participants had a median age of 24 (interquartile range (IQR) 20–33) years and manifested anorexia nervosa (61.47%), bulimia nervosa (16.88%), binge-eating disorders (9.09%), and other types of ED (12.55%). They were grouped into those likely presenting FA (N = 154) and those without FA (N = 77). The group with FA reported higher scores on all five CTQ subscales, as well as the total score of the EDI-2 (p < 0.001). Using mediation analysis; significant indirect pathways between all CTQ subscales and the EDI-2 total score emerged via FA, with the largest indirect effect emerging for physical neglect (standardized effect = 0.208; 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.127–0.29) followed by emotional abuse (standardized effect = 0.183; 95% CI 0.109–0.262). Conclusion: These results are compatible with a model in which certain types of childhood maltreatment, especially physical neglect, may induce, maintain, and/or exacerbate ED symptoms via FA which may guide future treatments.

Download Full-text

The impact of face masks on emotion recognition performance and perception of threat

10.31234/osf.io/6msz8 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Melina Grahlow ◽

Claudia Rupp ◽

Birgit Dernt

Keyword(s):

Social Interaction ◽

Emotion Recognition ◽

Recognition Performance ◽

Recognition Task ◽

Face Mask ◽

Facial Emotion ◽

Global Pandemic ◽

Perception Of Threat ◽

The Face ◽

The Impact

Facial emotion recognition is crucial for social interaction. However, in times of a global pandemic, where wearing a face mask covering mouth and nose is widely encouraged to prevent the spread of disease, successful emotion recognition may be challenging. In Study 1, we investigated whether emotion recognition, assessed by a validated emotion recognition task, is impaired for faces wearing a mask compared to uncovered faces, in a sample of 790 participants between 18 and 89 years. Additionally, perception of threat for faces with and without mask was assessed. We found impaired emotion recognition for faces wearing a mask compared to faces without mask, especially for those depicting anger, sadness and disgust. Further, we observed that perception of threat was altered for faces wearing a mask. In Study 2, we compared emotion recognition performance for faces with and without face mask to faces that are occluded by something other than a mask, i.e. a bubble as well as only showing the upper part of the faces. We found that, for most emotions and especially for disgust, there seems to be an effect that can be ascribed to the face mask specifically, both for emotion recognition performance and perception of threat. Methodological constraints as well as the importance of wearing a mask despite temporarily compromised social interaction are discussed.

Download Full-text

Language switching training modulates the neural network of non-linguistic cognitive control

PLoS ONE ◽

10.1371/journal.pone.0247100 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 16 (4) ◽

pp. e0247100

Author(s):

Mo Chen ◽

Fengyang Ma ◽

Zhaoqi Zhang ◽

Shuhua Li ◽

Man Zhang ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Neural Network ◽

Cognitive Control ◽

Structural Equation ◽

Structural Equation Models ◽

Brain Regions ◽

Anterior Cingulate ◽

Language Switching ◽

Dorsal Anterior Cingulate Cortex ◽

The Neural Network ◽

The Impact

Bilingual language experience, such as switching between languages, has been shown to shape both cognitive and neural mechanisms of non-linguistic cognitive control. However, the neural adaptations induced by language switching remain unclear. Using fMRI, the current study examined the impact of short-term language switching training on the neural network of domain-general cognitive control for unbalanced Chinese-English bilinguals. Effective connectivity maps were constructed by using the extended unified structural equation models (euSEM) within 10 common brain regions involved in both language control and domain-general cognitive control. Results showed that, the dorsal anterior cingulate cortex/pre-supplementary motor area (dACC/pre-SMA) lost connection from the right thalamus after training, suggesting that less neural connectivity was required to complete the same domain-general cognitive control task. These findings not only provide direct evidence for the modulation of language switching training on the neural interaction of domain-general cognitive control, but also have important implications for revealing the potential neurocognitive adaptation effects of specific bilingual language experiences.

Download Full-text