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Abstract
Negative relationships with parents and peers are considered risk factors for depression in adolescence, yet not all adolescents perceiving negative social relationships develop depression. In line with neurobiological susceptibility to social context models, we examined how individual differences in neural processing of parental praise, a unique form of social reward, might explain variability in susceptibility to perceived maternal acceptance and peer victimization. During neuroimaging, 38 11- to 17-year-olds with a history of anxiety listened to audio clips of a parent (predominately mothers) providing personalized praise and neutral statements. Average activation during parental praise clips relative to neutral clips was extracted from several anatomically-defined reward-related regions-of-interest (ROIs): the subgenual anterior cingulate cortex, caudate nucleus, amygdala, nucleus accumbens, and insula. Moderation models included direct effects and interactions between neural activation to social reward, peer victimization, and maternal acceptance at the time of scanning on depressive symptoms 1 year later. Results showed a significant three-way interaction for the bilateral caudate such that peer victimization was associated with depressive symptoms only for individuals with higher caudate response to praise who perceived maternal acceptance as low. Consistent with neurobiological susceptibility to social context models, caudate activation to social reward could represent a neural marker that helps explain variability in adolescent sensitivity to social contexts. High caudate activation to praise could reflect a history of negative experiences with parents and/or peers that places youth at greater risk for depressive symptoms. Findings suggest that interactions between neural response to reward and salient social contexts may help us understand changes in depressive symptoms during a period of development marked by significant biopsychosocial change.
Highlights
Rates of depression increase significantly during adolescence
No differences between youth diagnosed with an anxiety disorder at the time of data collection vs. youth not diagnosed with an anxiety disorder were found for age, sex, depressive symptoms, maternal acceptance, peer victimization, or neural activation to parental praise in any brain region
The current study suggests that interactions between adolescents’ caudate activation to social reward and perceived peer victimization and maternal acceptance help explain the development of depressive symptoms 1 year later
Summary
Rates of depression increase significantly during adolescence. While only about 2%–3% of 9- to 12-year-olds meet diagnostic criteria for any depressive disorder (Costello et al, 2003), this number jumps to 10%–20% between the ages of 13 and 18 (Lewinsohn et al, 1993; Merikangas et al, 2010) and may be even higher in youth with a history of anxiety (Pine et al, 1998; Kessler et al, 2001). Research investigating biopsychosocial risk factors for major depression in early-mid adolescence (ages 9–15) suggests that negative relationships with peers and parents (Reinherz et al, 1993) and altered functioning in rewardrelated brain regions (Forbes and Dahl, 2012) can increase the risk for developing a depressive disorder by age 18. Developmental models suggest that social stressors influence depressive symptoms through effects on reward-related brain function (Forbes and Dahl, 2005; Nelson et al, 2005; Davey et al, 2008). Examining how neurobiological and interpersonal factors work together to influence depressive symptoms is of heightened importance during adolescence, given significant changes in brain structure and function and reorganization of the social environment that occurs during this developmental period (Nelson et al, 2005)
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