61: Adolescent girls with conduct disorder: HPA axis reactivity in response to psychological stress

Abstract

Previous work demonstrated HPA axis hypoactivity in the morning in girls with Conduct Disorder (CD) compared to girls with no psychiatric disorder. The purpose of this study was to further characterize HPA axis function in girls with CD, comparing them to girls who had no psychiatric illness (NC) and girls who had depression or anxiety (DEP). This report describes preliminary analyses on the first two sets of assays completed. Girls, ages 15-16 years old and in Tanner Stage V, were recruited from the community. The participants and a parent received a structured psychiatric diagnostic interview and girls were categorized into three groups: CD, n=22; DEP, n=7; NC, n=8. We used the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) as the psychological stressor. Serum cortisol and plasma adrenocorticotropin hormone (ACTH) levels were assessed at the following times: −90, −60, 0, +15, +30, +60, and +90 minutes (0 was the beginning of the TSST). Response to the stressor was measured with area under the curve (AUC) analysis, and mean AUC was examined for a group effect. All the groups exhibited some activation of the HPA axis in response to the psychological stressor; ANOVA demonstrated a significant difference between the groups in both the ACTH and cortisol response (FACTH= 3.42; p = .05; FCortisol= 4.98; p = .01). Post-hoc analyses indicated that the girls with CD had mean AUC responses for both hormones that were significantly lower than those in the DEP group, but were not different from the NC group. The DEP group mean AUC for ACTH and cortisol were also significantly higher than those in the NC group. These preliminary findings suggest that girls with CD may have HPA axis responses to a psychological stressor that are similar to those found in girls without any psychiatric disorder. The high responsivity of the girls in the DEP group is somewhat surprising since previous studies have reported that adolescent depression is not associated with HPA axis abnormalities. All of our findings need to be further tested in a larger sample to insure generalizability. However, if we continue to find the same associations, this could have important implications in understanding the mechanisms underlying adolescent depression and anxiety in girls.