Orbital frontal cortex functional connectivity during gain anticipation linking the rumination and non-suicidal self-injury in late adolescence.

OBJECTIVE: Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) is prevalent and especially among the adolescence population. It has been argued that abnormal brain activations in reward processing could be regarded as objective biomarkers in NSSI, but the evidence is mixed. This study aims to explore the reward processing mechanism of NSSI from the perspective of functional brain circuitry and investigate the role of a cognitive factor (rumination). METHOD: Seventy-one 17-21 years old participants performed a monetary incentive delay (MID) task during functional magnetic resonance imaging scanning. Psychophysiological interaction (PPI) analysis was used to test the inner-group differences of brain functional connectivity. In addition, a mediation model was established with the mediation effect of rumination on the relationship between functional brain circuitry and NSSI. RESULTS: PPI analysis suggested that functional connectivity of the orbital frontal cortex (OFC) (with precuneus, SMA) was significantly enhanced in NSSI in the gain > loss contrast, but not in the loss > gain contrast. Mediation analysis revealed that rumination mediated the relationship between NSSI and the OFC- precuneus functional connectivity in the gain > loss contrast. CONCLUSION: Our research revealed that the abnormal OFC functional connectivity in gain (not loss) anticipation can be served as the sensitive biomarkers of NSSI. And there was a chain path for NSSI, that was from functional brain circuitry to negative cognition and then to problem behavior.

Childhood maltreatment and insomnia in college students: The role of alexithymia and psychological distress.

Insomnia, which is highly prevalent among college students, has been identified as one of the negative consequences of childhood maltreatment. While prior studies have uncovered distinct correlations between childhood maltreatment, insomnia, and other variables, the potential underlying mechanisms need to be further explored. This study focused on the chain-mediating role of alexithymia and psychological distress in the relationship between childhood maltreatment and insomnia. An online cross-sectional survey was conducted among Chinese college students, yielding 999 valid questionnaires that included demographic information, the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire-Short Form (CTQ-SF), the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS), the 21-item Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS-21), and the Insomnia Severity Index (ISI). A chain-mediating model was then tested. The results revealed significant positive correlations between each pair of the four variables. Alexithymia and psychological distress separately mediated the link between childhood maltreatment and insomnia (effect of alexithymia was 0.06 with 95 % CI [0.03, 0.09]; effect of psychological distress was 0.24 with 95 % CI [0.19, 0.29]). Additionally, a chain-mediating effect of alexithymia and psychological distress was observed (chain-mediating effect was 0.12 with 95 % CI [0.09, 0.15]). The findings suggest that emotional interventions may mitigate the long-term effect of childhood maltreatment on sleep problems among college students, by improving the ability to recognize emotions and decreasing emotional problems.

Effects of Impulsivity and Interpersonal Problems on Adolescent Depression: A Cross-Lagged Study.

The dynamic changes over time in the relationships between impulsivity, interpersonal problems, and depression warrant further exploration. This study delves into the roles of impulsivity and interpersonal issues in the progression of adolescent depression over a year, using a sample of 271 Chinese adolescents (51.7% male, Mage = 12.60 ± 0.69). At three time points, impulsivity levels were assessed with the Chinese version of the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale-11, interpersonal problems with the Adolescent Self-Rating Life Events Check List, and depression with the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale. Results revealed that both impulsivity and interpersonal problems serve as risk factors for depression, but the primary risk factor shifted over time. In early middle school stages, impulsivity was the predominant risk factor, while in later stages, interpersonal problems became the primary risk factor. These findings carry significant implications for directing prevention efforts and interventions for adolescent depression.

Problematic mobile phone use and time management disposition in Chinese college students: the chain mediating role of sleep quality and cognitive flexibility.

BACKGROUND: With the widespread adoption of smartphones, there has been a notable increase in problematic mobile phone use (PMPU), particularly prevalent among college students. Research suggests that apart from being associated with various problematic behaviors, this excessive mobile phone use might also have an impact on individual personality traits, such as time management disposition (TMD), which plays a significant role in individual motivation and psychological well-being. While previous literature has identified a negative relationship between PMPU and TMD, few studies have delved into the underlying mediating mechanism. Thus, the main aim of this study was to examine the chain mediating effect of sleep quality and cognitive flexibility on the relationship between PMPU and TMD. METHODS: A total of 921 Chinese college students completed the questionnaire. We collected basic information about the participants and assessed their PMPU, TMD, sleep quality, and cognitive flexibility using the Problematic Mobile Phone Use Scale-10, Adolescence Time Management Disposition Inventory, Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index scale and Cognitive Flexibility Inventory. RESULTS: The results indicated a significant correlation among all the variables. Moreover, we noted that both sleep quality and cognitive flexibility fully mediated the association between PMPU and TMD. Additionally, a chain mediating effect involving sleep quality and flexibility in this relationship was also identified. CONCLUSION: We found that sleep quality and cognitive flexibility had a series of multiple mediating effects in the pathway from PMPU to TMD, and both significantly mediated TMD. These findings indicated that impaired cognitive function and sleep quality may contribute to time management difficulties resulting from PMPU, suggesting that problematic behaviors like PMPU can impact one's personality traits. Therefore, interventions should be enhanced to mitigate the adverse effects of PMPU.

Attentional Bias to Emotional Facial Expressions in Undergraduates With Suicidal Ideation: An ERP Study.

Individuals who with suicide behaviors pay more attention to negative signals than positive ones. However, it is unclear that whether this bias exists when suicide ideators perceive interpersonal stimuli (such as faces with emotion) and the underlying neural mechanism of the attention process. The present study aimed to examine the attentional bias toward emotional facial expressions by employing event-related potentials in a population with suicide ideation. Twenty-five undergraduates with suicide ideation (SI group) and sixteen undergraduates without suicide ideation (NSI group) participated in a modified dot-probe task. Compared to the NSI group, the SI group exhibited: (1) a longer mean reaction time to fearful faces; (2) a larger N1 component to fearful faces; (3) a larger N1 component to the location of sad faces, as well as to the opposite location of fearful faces and happy faces; and (4) a larger N1 component to the contralateral location of happy faces, whereas the NSI group elicited a larger N1 component to the ipsilateral location of happy faces. These results indicated that the SI group was more sensitive to negative emotions (fearful and sad faces) than positive emotions (happy faces), and the negative interpersonal stimuli in suicide ideators was processed at an early attention stage.

The effects of childhood maltreatment on cyberbullying in college students: The roles of cognitive processes.

Previous studies suggested that childhood maltreatment was associated with cyberbullying. However, it's not clear the internal cognitive processes of how maltreatment causes cyberbullying. Therefore, the current study aims to explore the effect of childhood maltreatment on cyberbullying and the mediating effects of hostile attribution bias and anger rumination. A sample of 528 college students completed the measures of childhood maltreatment, cyberbullying, hostile attribution bias, and anger rumination. Multiple mediation analysis and bootstrapping showed that hostile attribution bias and anger rumination mediated the link between child maltreatment and cyberbullying. The results of this study suggested that childhood maltreatment increased the risk of cyberbullying, which was caused by a co-effect of hostile attribution bias and anger rumination, and it provides an intervention direction for effectively preventing the cyberbullying in abused individuals.

Sense of Coherence and Mental Health in College Students After Returning to School During COVID-19: The Moderating Role of Media Exposure.

The COVID-19 pandemic not only threatens people's physical health, but also affects their mental health in the long term. Although people had returned to work and school, they are closely monitoring the development of the epidemic and taking preventive measures. This study attempted to examine the relationship between media exposure, sense of coherence (SOC) and mental health, and the moderating effect of media exposure in college students after returning to school. In the present study, we conducted a cross sectional survey on 424 college students returning to school around May 2020. Self-report questionnaires were used to assess media exposure scale, SOC, depression, anxiety and stress. Correlation and moderation analysis was conducted. The results showed that (1) negative epidemic information exposure, rather than positive epidemic information exposure, was significantly associated with depression, anxiety, and stress. (2) SOC was also associated with depression, anxiety, and stress. (3) The effect of SOC on depression was modified by negative epidemic information exposure. With the increase of negative epidemic information exposure, the predictive effect of SOC on depression is increasing gradually. These findings demonstrated that negative epidemic information exposure was associated with an increased psychological distress in the sample. A high SOC played a certain protective role in the adaptation of college students in the post-epidemic period. It is important to find more ways to increase the colleges' SOC level and avoid negative information exposure.

Convergence of distinct functional networks supporting naming and semantic recognition in the left inferior frontal gyrus.

Naming individual objects is accompanied with semantic recognition. Previous studies examined brain-networks responsible for these operations individually. However, it remains unclear how these brain-networks are related. To address this problem, we examined the brain-networks during a novel object-naming task, requiring participants to name animals in photographs at a specific-level (e.g., "pigeon"). When the participants could not remember specific names, they answered basic names (e.g., "bird"). After fMRI scanning during the object-naming task, the participants rated familiarity of the animals based on their sense of knowing. Since participants tend to remember specific names for familiar objects compared with unfamiliar objects, a typical issue in an object-naming task is an internal covariance between the naming and familiarity levels. We removed this confounding factor by adjusting the familiarity/naming level of stimuli, and demonstrated distinct brain regions related to the two operations. Among them, the left inferior frontal gyrus triangularis (IFGtri) contained object-naming and semantic-recognition related areas in its anterior-ventral and posterior-dorsal parts, respectively. Psychophysiological interaction analyses suggested that both parts show connectivity with the brain regions related to object-naming. By examining the connectivity under control tasks requiring nonlexical semantic retrieval (e.g., animal's body color), we found that both IFGtri parts altered their targeting brain areas according to the required memory attributes, while only the posterior-dorsal part connected the brain regions related to semantic recognition. Together, the semantic recognition may be processed by distinct brain network from those for voluntary semantic retrievals including object-naming although all these networks are mediated by the posterior-dorsal IFGtri.

Associations between TCF4 gene polymorphism and cognitive functions in schizophrenia patients and healthy controls.

The SNP rs2958182 was reported to be significantly associated with schizophrenia (SCZ) in Han Chinese. This study examined this SNP's associations with cognitive functions in 580 SCZ patients and 498 controls. Cognitive functions were assessed using the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (WAIS-RC), the Attention Network Task (ANT), the Stroop task, the dot pattern expectancy (DPX), task and the N-back working memory task. Results showed significant or marginally significant interaction effects between genotype and diagnosis status on IQ (P=0.011) and attention-related tasks (ie, the forward digit span of WAIS-RC, P=0.005; the ANT conflict effect; P=0.020, and its ratios over mean reaction time (RT), P=0.036; the Stroop conflict effect, P=0.032, and its ratios over mean RT, P=0.062; and the DPX task's error rate under the BX condition, P<0.001, and the error rate of BX minus the error rate of AY (BX-AY), P=0.002). There were no such interaction effects on the measures of working memory (all P-values >0.05). Further analysis of the significant genotype-by-diagnosis interactions showed that the risk (T) allele was associated with better performance on cognitive tasks in patients but with worse performance in controls. These results seem to indicate that the association between this SNP and selected cognitive functions may be of an inverted U-shaped pattern. Future research is needed to replicate these results and to explore the biochemical mechanisms behind this association.

Evidence of IQ-modulated association between ZNF804A gene polymorphism and cognitive function in schizophrenia patients.

ZNF804A gene polymorphism rs1344706 has been suggested as the most compelling case of a candidate gene for schizophrenia by a genome-wide association study and several replication studies. The current study of 570 schizophrenia patients and 448 controls again found significantly different genotype frequencies of rs1344706 between patients and controls. More important, we found that this association was modulated by IQ, with a stronger association among individuals with relatively high IQ, which replicated results of Walters et al, 2010. We further examined whether this IQ-modulated association also existed between the SNP and the intermediate phenotypes (working memory and executive functions) of schizophrenia. Data were available from an N-back task (366 patients and 414 controls) and the attention network task (361 patients and 416 controls). We found that the SNP and IQ had significant interaction effects on the intermediate phenotypes for patients, but not for controls. The disease risk allele was associated with poorer cognitive function in patients with high IQ, but better cognitive function in patients with low IQ. Together, these results indicated that IQ may modulate the role of rs1344706 in the etiology of both schizophrenia and its cognitive impairments, and pointed to the necessity of considering general cognitive function as indexed by IQ in the future studies of genetic bases of schizophrenia.

The effects of CACNA1C gene polymorphism on spatial working memory in both healthy controls and patients with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder.

CACNA1C gene polymorphism (rs1006737) is a susceptibility factor for both schizophrenia (SCZ) and bipolar disorder (BP). However, its role in working memory, a cognitive function that is impaired in both diseases, is not clear. Using three samples, including healthy controls, patients with SCZ, and patients currently in manic episodes of BP, this study tested the association between the SNP rs1006737 and spatial working memory as measured by an N-back task and a dot pattern expectancy (DPX) task. Among SCZ patients and healthy controls, the clinical risk allele was associated with impaired working memory, but the association was either in opposite direction or non-significant in patients with BP. These results indicated that rs1006737 may have differential effects on working memory in different disease populations and pointed to the necessity for more studies in different patient populations.

S100B gene polymorphisms predict prefrontal spatial function in both schizophrenia patients and healthy individuals.

Animal studies have strongly implicated a role of S100B in spatial ability and our recent study of humans found that S100B gene polymorphisms (rs9722, rs1051169, and rs2839357) were associated with schizophrenia patients' spatial ability (as assessed by a block design task and a mental rotation task). In this study, we explored the associations between these and three additional SNPs in S100B and prefrontal functions (working memory and executive control) among 434 schizophrenia patients and 412 healthy controls. Results showed that, for both schizophrenia patients and healthy controls, two SNPs were significantly associated with prefrontal functions in the spatial domain (P value threshold was set at 0.014 after correcting for multiple comparisons), with the AA genotype of rs9722 and the GG genotype of rs2839357 linked to poorer performance. No SNP was associated with prefontal functions in the verbal domain (all Ps >0.05). These results extend our previous study and further confirm the important roles of the S100B gene in spatial abilities.

Risk variants in the S100B gene, associated with elevated S100B levels, are also associated with visuospatial disability of schizophrenia.

Rs9722 and rs1051169 have been reported as affecting the levels of S100B in the serum or the brain, and haplotypes containing these two SNPs have been associated with schizophrenia. The current study investigated the role of the S100B gene in an endophenotype of schizophrenia-spatial disability. 304 schizophrenia patients and 196 healthy controls were given a block design task and a mental rotation task. Results showed that the two aforementioned SNPs and related haplotypes were associated with the spatial disability of schizophrenia patients. Specifically, risk factors for the elevated S100B levels, including the A allele of rs9722, the G allele of rs1051169, and the AG haplotype, were associated with a poorer performance on both tests of spatial ability, especially the mental rotation task. These results implicate a role for S100B gene polymorphisms in the cognitive functions of schizophrenia patients and encourage further investigation into spatial disability as an endophenotype of schizophrenia.