Exploring the long-term impact of early life adversity on the (anti-)social brain

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Although the study of environmental adversity promises to provide important clues about individual variation in the etiology of complex psychiatric disorders, conclusive pathways to brain endophenotypes of social and antisocial behavior are largely missing. A combination of research of the long-term effects of early environmental adversity with neuroimaging may provide a powerful strategy. In the proposed project, we aim to study the impact of environmental adversities during early development on neural networks implicated in social behavior, as assessed by structural MRI and functional MRI. 280 young adults (both healthy and with current psychopathology) from an epidemiological cohort study followed since birth will be assessed. In detail, neural circuitries will be examined encompassing different dimensions of social behavior, such as social interaction, social cognition, modulation of social behavior and motivation. Candidate environmental conditions with sizeable and established effects on brain function and structure in this sample, covering prenatal and early postnatal adversities, will be investigated. The identification of neural mechanisms underlying the effects of early adversity on neural networks implicated in social behavior, and their stability over time, will help to establish more effective ways of diagnosing, preventing and treating mental disorders, especially those involved in antisocial behavior.