MRI Study of Brain Activity and Risk for Depression in Adolescents

NCT00047944 | Completed

• 2 other identifiers: 03001403-M-0014
• Study Type: observational
• Target: 88
• Locations: 1 country
• Sites: 1

Brief Summary

Anxiety in children of parents with major depressive disorder (MDD) poses a particularly high risk for later-life MDD. In adults, MDD involves dysfunction in prefrontal brain regions that regulate attention to emotional stimuli. These abnormalities: i) have been found primarily in adults with specific familial forms of MDD; ii) persist after recovery from MDD, and iii) relate to anxiety. These findings raise the possibility that risk for MDD is tied to dysfunction in prefrontal regions involved in regulation of emotion, which possibly manifests as early-life anxiety. If this possibility were confirmed in never-depressed adolescents at high risk for MDD, the findings would provide key insights into the developmental neurobiology of MDD. The goal of this protocol is to study the neural substrate of risk for MDD in young people. This protocol tests the hypothesis that adolescents at high risk for MDD by virtue of childhood anxiety and parental history of MDD exhibit dysfunction in prefrontal cortex and amygdala, regions involved in emotion regulation. This goal will be accomplished through fMRI studies of emotion regulation in high and low-risk adolescents. For this research, at-risk adolescents will be recruited from participants in an NIMH-funded extramural study at New York University (NYU) examining the biology of risk for anxiety and depressive disorders. Over a three-year period, 45 high-risk probands and 60 low-risk comparisons will be studied, including 20 comparisons from the NYU sample and 40 from the Washington DC metropolitan area. In the present protocol, to be conducted at NIH, subjects will undergo volumetric MRI scans to assess structural abnormalities in the prefrontal cortex and medial temporal lobe. They will complete a series of four out-of-scanner cognitive tasks and two fMRI-based cognitive tasks that measure modulation of attention to emotional stimuli. The fMRI tasks are hypothesized to differentially engage the prefrontal cortex and amygdala in low vs. high risk subjects. These tasks will be used to test the hypothesis that at-risk individuals exhibit enhanced amygdala and reduced prefrontal activation on the fMRI emotion/attention tasks.

Conditions

Involutional Depression; Anxiety Disorders

Keywords

Attention; Emotion; Amygdala; Prefrontal Cortex; Facial Expression; Magnetic Resonance Imaging; fMRI; Depression; Anxiety; Adolescence; Children

Eligibility Criteria

• Age: 10 Years - 55 Years
• Sex: all
• Healthy Volunteers: No
• Age Groups: Child (0-17), Adult (18-64)

You may qualify if:

• Age: 10-30.
• Can give consent/assent. Parents will provide consent for all minors.
• All subjects will have IQ greater than 80.
• High risk Psychopathology: Offspring of adults with a history of MDD.
• Low risk Psychopathology: Offspring of adults with no history of MDD and low developmental levels of emotion dysregulation. Subjects born to parents with only anxiety disorders will be included in this group.

You may not qualify if:

• Any medical condition that increases risk for MRI (e.g. pacemaker, metallic foreign body in eye).
• Pregnancy:
• Both groups: All subjects will be free of current impairing affective disorders, separation anxiety disorder, social anxiety disorder, panic disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, PTSD, ADHD, as well as lifetime history of substance dependence, psychosis, pervasive developmental disorder, major affective disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, conduct disorder, anorexia. All subjects will be born to parents with no history of schizophrenia or bipolar disorder.
• Age: 18-55
• Can give consent/assent
• Offspring: All subjects will have offspring participating in this same protocol.
• Have an IQ greater than 80
• Past history of MDD
• No lifetime history of MDD
• Any medical condition that increases risk for MRI (e.g. pacemaker, metallic foreign body in eye)
• Pregnancy:
• Both groups: All subjects will be free of current significantly impairing affective disorders, psychotropic medications, as well as lifetime history of substance dependence, psychosis, conduct disorder, or anorexia.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH): lead

Study Sites (1)

National Institutes of Health Clinical Center, 9000 Rockville Pike

Bethesda, Maryland, 20892, United States

Location

Related Publications (3)

• Drevets WC, Ongur D, Price JL. Neuroimaging abnormalities in the subgenual prefrontal cortex: implications for the pathophysiology of familial mood disorders. Mol Psychiatry. 1998 May;3(3):220-6, 190-1. doi: 10.1038/sj.mp.4000370.

  PMID: 9672897 BACKGROUND

• Drevets WC. Neuroimaging and neuropathological studies of depression: implications for the cognitive-emotional features of mood disorders. Curr Opin Neurobiol. 2001 Apr;11(2):240-9. doi: 10.1016/s0959-4388(00)00203-8.

  PMID: 11301246 BACKGROUND

• Drevets WC. Neuroimaging studies of mood disorders. Biol Psychiatry. 2000 Oct 15;48(8):813-29. doi: 10.1016/s0006-3223(00)01020-9.

  PMID: 11063977 BACKGROUND

MeSH Terms

Conditions

Depressive Disorder, Major; Anxiety Disorders; Facial Expression; Depression

Condition Hierarchy (Ancestors)

Depressive Disorder; Mood Disorders; Mental Disorders; Nonverbal Communication; Communication; Behavior; Behavioral Symptoms

Study Officials

• Daniel S Pine, M.D.

  National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH)

  PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR

Study Design

• Study Type: observational
• Sponsor Type: NIH
• Responsible Party: SPONSOR

Study Record Dates

• First Submitted: October 22, 2002
• First Posted: October 23, 2002
• Study Start: October 12, 2002
• Study Completion: October 27, 2016
• Last Updated: October 6, 2017

Record last verified: 2016-10-27

Locations

US (1)