Editorial: Are Neural Biomarkers Valid for All Children?
Editorial: Are Neural Biomarkers Valid for All Children?
复制标题
社论：神经生物标志物对所有儿童都有效吗？
DOI：
10.1016/j.jaac.2022.08.006
复制
发表时间：
2022
影响因子：
13.3
通讯作者：
Delaney,ScottW
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Delaney,ScottW
就像所有的生活经历一样，怀孕会改变发育中的大脑。精神病理学也可以。但怎么做呢？什么时候？为什麽？当孩子们同时面临贫困和疾病时，大脑发育会发生什么？如今，在美国，每五个孩子中就有一个在贫困中长大，每个孩子患抑郁症的风险都更高，回答这些问题仍然是公共心理健康最重要的任务之一。然而，这样做是非常具有挑战性的：研究人员必须破译一系列相互作用的社会和生物过程。然而，科学家们近年来已经取得了相当大的进展。多项研究现在报告说，儿童贫困可能会导致发育中的大脑海马体积变小。与此同时，一个完全独立的研究机构--主要是在临床样本中进行的--反复发现重性抑郁症（MDD）和海马体体积较小之间的联系。但是，尽管童年贫困和抑郁都与海马体积较小独立相关，但很少有研究探讨它们的综合影响。Herzberg等人1着手解决这一差距，他们报告了一些挑衅性的发现。最令人惊讶的是，作者发现，在他们的样本中，儿童抑郁症确实与海马体积较小有关，但仅限于高收入家庭的儿童。他们没有发现任何证据表明在贫困中长大的孩子之间存在类似的联系。这意味着先前报道的抑郁症和海马体积较小之间的关联在所有家庭收入水平上可能并不一致。在另一项研究中，作者还报告说，较低的家庭收入与较小的海马体积有关，但这只发生在抑郁症状较轻的儿童中，而不发生在严重抑郁的儿童中。
Poverty—like all life experiences—can change the developing brain. Psychopathology can, too. But how? And when? And why? And what happens to brain development when children face both poverty and pathology at the same time? With 1 in 5 children growing up poor in the United States today—each at higher risk for developing depression—answering these questions remains among public mental health’s most important imperatives. Yet doing so is wickedly challenging: investigators must decipher a wide array of interacting social and biological processes.And yet, scientists have made considerable progress in recent years. Multiple studies now report that childhood poverty may cause smaller hippocampal volumes in the developing brain. Meanwhile, an entirely separate body of research—largely conducted in clinical samples—has repeatedly found an association between major depressive disorder (MDD) and smaller volumes in the hippocampus. But while both childhood poverty and depression have been independently associated with smaller hippocampal volumes, few studies have explored their combined effects. Herzberg et al. 1 set out to address this gap, and they report some provocative findings. Most surprisingly, the authors found that childhood depression was indeed associated with smaller hippocampal volume across development in their sample—but only among children of higher income households. They found no evidence of a similar association among children growing up poor. This means that previously reported associations between depression and smaller hippocampal volumes may not be consistent across all levels of family income. In a separate finding, the authors also report that lower family income was associated with smaller hippocampal volume—but only among children with lower levels of depressive symptoms and not among children with severe depression.