Abstract
Children who have experienced chronic parental rejection and exclusion during childhood, as is the case in childhood emotional maltreatment, may become especially sensitive to social exclusion. This study investigated the neural and emotional responses to social exclusion (with the Cyberball task) in young adults reporting childhood emotional maltreatment. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we investigated brain responses and self-reported distress to social exclusion in 46 young adult patients and healthy controls (mean age = 19.2±2.16) reporting low to extreme childhood emotional maltreatment. Consistent with prior studies, social exclusion was associated with activity in the ventral medial prefrontal cortex and posterior cingulate cortex. In addition, severity of childhood emotional maltreatment was positively associated with increased dorsal medial prefrontal cortex responsivity to social exclusion. The dorsal medial prefrontal cortex plays a crucial role in self-and other-referential processing, suggesting that the more individuals have been rejected and maltreated in childhood, the more self- and other- processing is elicited by social exclusion in adulthood. Negative self-referential thinking, in itself, enhances cognitive vulnerability for the development of psychiatric disorders. Therefore, our findings may underlie the emotional and behavioural difficulties that have been reported in adults reporting childhood emotional maltreatment.
Highlights
Chronic parental rejection can be considered a core aspect of Childhood Emotional Maltreatment (CEM; emotional abuse and/ or emotional neglect) [1]
If peak voxel activations fell within these predetermined regions of interest (ROIs), to further protect against Type 1 errors, we report whether these activations were significant after small volume correction (SVC) for the spatial extent of the activated region
A Group (CEM, Controls) by measurement moment (Inclusion, Exclusion, Post Scanning) rmANOVA on mood revealed a main effect of measurement moment on mood score (F(2,86) = 67.47, P,.001), and post-hoc t-tests showed that for both groups mood scores significantly decreased from inclusion to exclusion (t’s. 5.58, Ps,.001), and significantly increased from exclusion to post scanning (t’s,4.53, P’s,.001)
Summary
Chronic parental rejection can be considered a core aspect of Childhood Emotional Maltreatment (CEM; emotional abuse and/ or emotional neglect) [1]. Social rejection, ranging from active isolation to ignoring basic emotional needs, may enhance sensitivity towards future rejection [5]. Along these lines, individuals reporting CEM may be especially sensitive to (perceived) social rejection. Individuals high in rejection sensitivity have a tendency to expect, perceive, and overreact to social rejection, and show enhanced distress and related neural responses to social rejection in the lab [5]. Enhanced distress and neural responses to (perceived) social rejection may be one of the mechanisms through which a history of CEM may predispose individuals to the development of depressive and anxiety disorders in later life. The subjective and neural responses to social rejection in individuals reporting CEM are currently unknown
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