Ringwald, Kai G, Meller, Tina, Schmitt, Simon, Andlauer, Till FM, Stein, Frederike, Brosch, Katharina, Pfarr, Julia-Katharina, Steinstraeter, Olaf, Meinert, Susanne, Lemke, Hannah et al (show 16 more authors)
(2021)
Interaction of developmental factors and ordinary stressful life events on brain structure in adults.
NEUROIMAGE-CLINICAL, 30.
102683-.
Abstract
An interplay of early environmental and genetic risk factors with recent stressful life events (SLEs) in adulthood increases the risk for adverse mental health outcomes. The interaction of early risk and current SLEs on brain structure has hardly been investigated. Whole brain voxel-based morphometry analysis was performed in N = 786 (64.6% female, mean age = 33.39) healthy subjects to identify correlations of brain clusters with commonplace recent SLEs. Genetic and early environmental risk factors, operationalized as those for severe psychopathology (i.e., polygenic scores for neuroticism, childhood maltreatment, urban upbringing and paternal age) were assessed as modulators of the impact of SLEs on the brain. SLEs were negatively correlated with grey matter volume in the left medial orbitofrontal cortex (mOFC, FWE p = 0.003). This association was present for both, positive and negative, life events. Cognitive-emotional variables, i.e., neuroticism, perceived stress, trait anxiety, intelligence, and current depressive symptoms did not account for the SLE-mOFC association. Further, genetic and environmental risk factors were not correlated with grey matter volume in the left mOFC cluster and did not affect the association between SLEs and left mOFC grey matter volume. The orbitofrontal cortex has been implicated in stress-related psychopathology, particularly major depression in previous studies. We find that SLEs are associated with this area. Important early life risk factors do not interact with current SLEs on brain morphology in healthy subjects.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | Stressful life events, Orbitofrontal cortex, Voxel-based morphometry, Magnetic resonance imaging |
| Divisions: | Faculty of Health and Life Sciences Faculty of Health and Life Sciences > Institute of Population Health |
| Depositing User: | Symplectic Admin |
| Date Deposited: | 09 Dec 2021 10:16 |
| Last Modified: | 18 Jan 2023 21:23 |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.nicl.2021.102683 |
| Open Access URL: | https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nicl.2021.102683 |
| Related URLs: | |
| URI: | https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3145049 |
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