Parenting Environment, Adolescent Frontoamygdala Resting-State Connectivity, and Depression Symptoms During the COVID-19 Pandemic

• In Event: Neurobiological Predictors of Adolescent Mental Health during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic is a unique period of disruption and stress that is contributing to increasing mental health problems in adolescents (Duan et al., 2020). Some adolescents, however, may be more or less vulnerable to mental health problems during this period. We examined resting-state functional connectivity between the subgenual anterior cingulate cortex (sgACC) and amygdala, a circuit implicated in stress (Taren et al., 2015), as a potential predictive marker of risk for experiencing depression symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic. We also examined whether individual differences in the functioning of this circuit could be explained by the parenting environment earlier in adolescence.

Participants were 211 adolescents from the Bay Area who completed up to 3 assessments across a 4-year period (approximately 2 years between each timepoint). At Time 1 (mean age=12.22 years, SD=1.50, range=9.34-15.82), adolescents reported on parental warmth and psychological control using the Parenting Styles and Dimensions Questionnaire and the Psychological Control Scale. We computed a difference score representing parental warmth relative to parental psychological control. Two years later at Time 2 (mean age=14.28, SD=1.59, range=11.08-17.91), adolescents reported on their depression symptoms using the Child Depression Inventory (CDI) and completed a resting-state fMRI scan. We measured functional connectivity between the bilateral sgACC and the basolateral (BLA) and centromedial (CMA) amygdala subdivisions. At Time 3 (mean age=16.30, SD=1.45, range=12.82-19.98), approximately three weeks after shelter-in place was implemented in the Bay Area, participants self-reported on their depression symptoms using the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CESD). We used structural equation modeling to assess relations among parenting at Time 1, sgACC–amygdala connectivity and depression at Time 2, and depression symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic at Time 3. We created two latent variables for sgACC–amygdala connectivity; one with the left and right sgACC–BLA connectivity variables as indicators, and one with the left and right sgACC–CMA as indicators.

Figure 1 presents the structural equation model including sgACC–BLA as the circuit of interest. This model showed good fit with the data (chi-square(11)=12.82, p=.305, CFI=0.99, RMSEA=.03(90% CI: .00, .08). Less parental warmth relative to psychological control at Time 1 was associated with heightened sgACC–BLA connectivity at Time 2 (B=-.22, p=.031), which, in turn, was associated concurrently with more severe depression symptoms (r=.20, p=.031), and prospectively with more severe depression symptoms during the pandemic (B=.20, p=.037). This longitudinal association was independent of the effect of pre-pandemic depression symptoms (Time 2) on depression symptoms during the pandemic (Time 3; B=.31, p=.002). In a separate model, sgACC–CMA connectivity was not significantly associated with parenting or depression symptoms before or during the pandemic (all p>.089).

These results provide evidence that sgACC–BLA resting-state connectivity is a biomarker in adolescents of both concurrent depression and subsequent risk for depression during the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, this circuitry may be affected by parenting behaviors in early adolescence. Perceiving or experiencing less parental warmth relative to psychological control may lead to a pattern of sgACC–BLA connectivity that underlies risk for depression.

Authors

• Jonas G. Miller, Stanford University
  Presenting Author

• Tiffany C Ho, University of California - San Francisco
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jaclyn Schwartz Kirshenbaum, Columbia University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Anthony J. Gifuni
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ian Gotlib, Stanford University
  Non-Presenting Author