Abstract
Reward processing is altered in various psychopathologies and has been shown to be susceptible to genetic and environmental influences. Here, we examined whether maternal care may buffer familial risk for psychiatric disorders in terms of reward processing. Functional magnetic resonance imaging during a monetary incentive delay task was acquired in participants of an epidemiological cohort study followed since birth (N = 172, 25 years). Early maternal stimulation was assessed during a standardized nursing/playing setting at the age of 3 months. Parental psychiatric disorders (familial risk) during childhood and the participants’ previous psychopathology were assessed by diagnostic interview. With high familial risk, higher maternal stimulation was related to increasing activation in the caudate head, the supplementary motor area, the cingulum and the middle frontal gyrus during reward anticipation, with the opposite pattern found in individuals with no familial risk. In contrast, higher maternal stimulation was associated with decreasing caudate head activity during reward delivery and reduced levels of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in the high-risk group. Decreased caudate head activity during reward anticipation and increased activity during delivery were linked to ADHD. These findings provide evidence of a long-term association of early maternal stimulation on both adult neurobiological systems of reward underlying externalizing behavior and ADHD during development.
Highlights
Reward processing is one of the key neuronal phenotypes altered in externalizing (Finger et al, 2011; Kappel et al, 2015; von Rhein et al, 2015) and in internalizing disorders (Stringaris et al, 2015)
Higher maternal stimulation was related to increasing activation in the caudate head, the supplementary motor area, the cingulum and the middle frontal gyrus during reward anticipation, with the opposite pattern found in individuals with no familial risk
Higher maternal stimulation predicted a decreased level of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) (β=-.18, p=.008) but was unrelated to other psychiatric disorders
Summary
Reward processing is one of the key neuronal phenotypes altered in externalizing (Finger et al, 2011; Kappel et al, 2015; von Rhein et al, 2015) and in internalizing disorders (Stringaris et al, 2015). Most studies reported reduced activation in the basal ganglia during reward anticipation as a function of early adversity (Boecker et al, 2014; Dillon et al, 2009; Holz et al, 2017; Mehta et al, 2010) and, strikingly, of this vulnerability perspective is undoubtedly relevant, it seems important to identify protective factors (Hoffmann et al, 2016; Vidal-Ribas et al, 2015) One such protective factor might be the quality of mother-child interaction, its effect on the reward circuitry has rarely been investigated. Research has indicated a persistent alteration of affective processing as a function of early mother-infant interaction (Moutsiana et al, 2014), with regard to VS responding during reward processing (Morgan et al, 2014; Schneider et al, 2012)
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