Neural differentiation of emotional faces as a function of interpersonal violence among adolescent girls.

Interpersonal violence (IV) is associated with altered neural threat processing and risk for psychiatric disorder. Representational similarity analysis (RSA) is a multivariate approach examining the extent to which differences between stimuli correspond to differences in multivoxel activation patterns to these stimuli within each ROI. Using RSA, we examine overlap in neural patterns between threat and neutral faces in youth with IV.

Psychosocial moderators of polygenic risk scores of inflammatory biomarkers in relation to GrimAge.

GrimAge acceleration has previously predicted age-related morbidities and mortality. In the current study, we sought to examine how GrimAge is associated with genetic predisposition for systemic inflammation and whether psychosocial factors moderate this association. Military veterans from the National Health and Resilience in Veterans study, which surveyed a nationally representative sample of European American male veterans, provided saliva samples for genotyping (N = 1135).

Biological embedding of early trauma: the role of higher prefrontal synaptic strength.

Early trauma predicts poor psychological and physical health. Glutamatergic synaptic processes offer one avenue for understanding this relationship, given glutamate's abundance and involvement in reward and stress sensitivity, emotion, and learning. Trauma-induced glutamatergic excitotoxicity may alter neuroplasticity and approach/avoidance tendencies, increasing risk for psychiatric disorders.

Neural complexity EEG biomarkers of rapid and post-rapid ketamine effects in late-life treatment-resistant depression: a randomized control trial.

Ketamine is an effective intervention for treatment-resistant depression (TRD), including late-in-life (LL-TRD). The proposed mechanism of antidepressant effects of ketamine is a glutamatergic surge, which can be measured by electroencephalogram (EEG) gamma oscillations. Yet, non-linear EEG biomarkers of ketamine effects such as neural complexity are needed to capture broader systemic effects, represent the level of organization of synaptic communication, and elucidate mechanisms of action for treatment responders.

Diminished prospective mental representations of reward mediate reward learning strategies among youth with internalizing symptoms.

Background: Adolescent internalizing symptoms and trauma exposure have been linked with altered reward learning processes and decreased ventral striatal responses to rewarding cues. Recent computational work on decision-making highlights an important role for prospective representations of the imagined outcomes of different choices. This study tested whether internalizing symptoms and trauma exposure among youth impact the generation of prospective reward representations during decision-making and potentially mediate altered behavioral strategies during reward learning.

Replication of distinct trajectories of antidepressant response to intravenous ketamine.

Background: The goal of this study was to replicate previous findings of three distinct treatment response pathways associated with repeated intravenous (IV) ketamine infusions among patients with major depressive disorder (MDD).

Methods: We conducted growth mixture modeling to estimate latent classes of change in depression (Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology-Self Report, QIDS-SR) across six treatment visits in 298 patients with MDD treated with IV ketamine in an outpatient community clinic. Mean age was 40.

Psychosocial Factors Associated With Accelerated GrimAge in Male U.S. Military Veterans.

Objective: Veterans are at high risk for health morbidities linked to premature mortality. Recently developed "epigenetic clock" algorithms, which compute intra-individual differences between biological and chronological aging, can help inform prediction of accelerated biological aging and mortality risk. To date, however, scarce research has examined potentially modifiable correlates of GrimAge, a novel epigenetic clock comprised of DNA methylation surrogates of plasma proteins and smoking pack-years associated with various morbidities and time-to-death.

Attachment Style Moderates Polygenic Risk for Incident Posttraumatic Stress in U.S. Military Veterans: A 7-Year, Nationally Representative, Prospective Cohort Study.

Background: Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) develops consequent to complex gene-by-environment interactions beyond the precipitating trauma. To date, however, no known study has used a prospective design to examine how polygenic risk scores (PRSs) interact with social-environmental factors such as attachment style to predict PTSD development.

Methods: PRSs were derived from a genome-wide association study of PTSD symptoms (N = 186,689; Million Veteran Program cohort).

Attachment Style Moderates Polygenic Risk for Posttraumatic Stress in United States Military Veterans: Results From the National Health and Resilience in Veterans Study.

Background: A polygenic risk score (PRS) derived from genome-wide association studies of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) may inform risk for this disorder. To date, however, no known study has examined whether social environmental factors such as attachment style may moderate the relation between PRS and PTSD.

Methods: We evaluated main and interactive effects of PRS and attachment style on PTSD symptoms in a nationally representative sample of trauma-exposed European-American U.

Accelerated DNA Methylation Aging in U.S. Military Veterans: Results From the National Health and Resilience in Veterans Study.

Objective: The aim of this study was to identify how a broad range of sociodemographic, military, health, and psychosocial factors relate to accelerated DNA methylation aging (Δ) in a large, contemporary, nationally representative sample of male U.S. veterans.

Attachment style moderates effects of polymorphisms and childhood abuse on post-traumatic stress symptoms: Results from the National Health and Resilience in Veterans Study.

To determine the main and interactive effects of four polymorphisms (rs9296158, rs3800373, rs1360780 and rs9470080), childhood abuse and attachment style in predicting severity of PTSD symptoms in two independent, nationally representative samples of US military veterans. Data were analysed from two independent samples of European-American US military veterans who participated in the National Health and Resilience in Veterans Study ( = 1,585 and 577 respectively). Results revealed that carriage of two minor alleles, childhood abuse and insecure attachment style were associated with greater severity of PTSD symptoms.

Romance, risk, and replication: Can consumer choices and risk-taking be primed by mating motives?

Interventions aimed at influencing spending behavior and risk-taking have considerable practical importance. A number of studies motivated by the costly signaling theory within evolutionary psychology have reported that priming inductions (such as looking at pictures of attractive opposite sex members) designed to trigger mating motives increase males' stated willingness to purchase conspicuous consumption items and to engage in risk-taking behaviors, and reduce loss aversion. However, a meta-analysis of this literature reveals strong evidence of either publication bias or p-hacking (or both).