ENIGMA-Meditation: Worldwide consortium for neuroscientific investigations of meditation practices.

Meditation is a family of ancient and contemporary contemplative mind-body practices that can modulate psychological processes, awareness, and mental states. Over the last 40 years, clinical science has manualised meditation practices and designed various meditation interventions (MIs), that have shown therapeutic efficacy for disorders including depression, pain, addiction, and anxiety. Over the past decade, neuroimaging has examined the neuroscientific basis of meditation practices, effects, states, and outcomes for clinical and non-clinical populations.

Editorial: A Meta-Analysis of the Treatment of Acute Mania in Youth: Why Do Atypical Antipsychotics Work Better Than Mood Stabilizers?

Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of youth with mania are very challenging to conduct, given the low base rate of bipolar disorder (BD) and the relative rarity of mania (vs bipolar depression, which tends to be much more common). Thus, many of the RCTs are relatively small, and it may be difficult to clinically interpret results. At the same time, findings about which anti-manic medications are most effective in youth are of critical importance, both because (1) poorly treated mania can lead to substantial negative psychosocial consequences, and (2) these medications can have significant adverse effects.

Person-level contributions of bipolar polygenic risk score to the prediction of new-onset bipolar disorder in at-risk offspring.

Background: Previous work indicates that polygenic risk scores (PRS) for bipolar disorder (BD) are elevated in adults and youth with BD, but whether BD-PRS can inform person-level diagnostic prediction is unknown. Here, we test whether BD-PRS improves performance of a previously published risk calculator (RC) for BD.

Methods: 156 parents with BD-I/II and their offspring ages 6-18 were recruited and evaluated with standardized diagnostic assessments every two years for >12 years.

Editorial: Following Offspring of Parents With Bipolar Disorder Into Middle Adulthood: Risk Windows Relevant to Child Psychiatrists.

The most important predictor of bipolar disorder (BD) onset is a family history. Based on this premise, several offspring studies have recruited and followed offspring of parents with BD into early adulthood, including the Pittsburgh Bipolar Offspring Study, the Canadian Flourish Cohort, and the Dutch Bipolar Offspring Study (DBOS). These studies have shed important light on the incidence and prevalence of BD and other psychopathology in these offspring (11%-13% for BD-I/II), as well as the most important symptom-level and diagnostic predictors of BD in these youth.

Controlled Study of Metabolic Syndrome Among Offspring of Parents With Bipolar Disorder.

Bipolar disorder (BD) is highly heritable and associated with increased rates of metabolic syndrome (MetS). However, little is known about MetS in offspring of parents with BD. We therefore examined this topic in the Pittsburgh Bipolar Offspring Study cohort.

Examining Factors Associated With Medication Adherence in Youth With Bipolar Disorder.

Objective: To assess medication adherence and factors associated with poor adherence in youth with bipolar disorder (BD) followed from adolescence through young adulthood.

Method: Participants with BD recruited through the Course and Outcome of Bipolar Youth (COBY) study were included in this study if they were prescribed psychotropic medications and had at least 3 follow-up assessments of medication adherence (N= 179, ages 12-36). Medication adherence had been evaluated for a median of 8 years using a questionnaire derived from the Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults (CARDIA) study.

Sleep patterns among preschool offspring of parents with and without psychopathology: Association with the development of psychopathology in childhood.

Background: Disturbed sleep during early childhood predicts social-emotional problems. However, it is not known how various early childhood sleep phenotypes are associated with the development of childhood psychopathology, nor whether these relationships vary as a function of parental psychopathology. We identified sleep phenotypes among preschool youth; examined whether these phenotypes were associated with child and parent factors; and determined if early sleep phenotypes predicted later childhood psychopathology.

Polygenic Scores and Onset of Major Mood or Psychotic Disorders Among Offspring of Affected Parents.

Objective: Family history is an established risk factor for mental illness. The authors sought to investigate whether polygenic scores (PGSs) can complement family history to improve identification of risk for major mood and psychotic disorders.

Methods: Eight cohorts were combined to create a sample of 1,884 participants ages 2-36 years, including 1,339 offspring of parents with mood or psychotic disorders, who were prospectively assessed with diagnostic interviews over an average of 5.

Early indicators of bipolar risk in preschool offspring of parents with bipolar disorder.

Background: Offspring of parents with bipolar disorder (BD-I/II) are at increased risk to develop the disorder. Previous work indicates that bipolar spectrum disorder (BPSD) is often preceded by mood/anxiety symptoms. In school-age offspring of parents with BD, we previously built a risk calculator to predict BPSD onset, which generates person-level risk scores.

Prospectively ascertained mania and hypomania among young adults with child- and adolescent-onset bipolar disorder.

Objectives: While adults with bipolar disorder (BD) often report symptoms starting in childhood, continuity of mania and/or hypomania (mania/hypomania) from childhood to adulthood has been questioned. Using longitudinal data from the Course and Outcome of Bipolar Youth (COBY) study, we assessed threshold mania/hypomania in young adults who manifested BD as youth.

Methods: COBY is a naturalistic, longitudinal study of 446 youth with BD (84% recruited from outpatient clinics), 7-17 years old at intake, and over 11 years of follow-up.

Generalizing the Prediction of Bipolar Disorder Onset Across High-Risk Populations.

Objective: Risk calculators (RC) to predict clinical outcomes are gaining interest. An RC to estimate risk of bipolar spectrum disorders (BPSD) could help reduce the duration of undiagnosed BPSD and improve outcomes. Our objective was to adapt an RC previously validated in the Pittsburgh Bipolar Offspring Study (BIOS) sample to achieve adequate predictive ability in both familial high-risk and clinical high-risk youths.

Mindfulness-based intervention to decrease mood lability in at-risk youth: Preliminary evidence for changes in resting state functional connectivity.

Background: In youth at familial risk for bipolar disorder (BD), mood lability is an important precursor to BD onset. Previous work in adults indicates that mindfulness-based interventions (MBI) may improve emotion regulation, in part by increasing resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) between posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) and executive control network (ECN). In this pilot study, we assessed effects of an MBI on PCC-ECN rsFC and mood lability in at-risk youth.

The impact of familial risk and early life adversity on emotion and reward processing networks in youth at-risk for bipolar disorder.

A recently developed risk calculator for bipolar disorder (BD) accounts for clinical and parental psychopathology. Yet, it is understood that both familial predisposition and early life adversity contribute to the development of BD. How the interplay between these two factors influence emotion and reward processing networks in youth at risk for BD remains unclear.

Intrinsic functional connectivity correlates of person-level risk for bipolar disorder in offspring of affected parents.

Offspring of parents with bipolar disorder (OBP) are at increased risk to develop bipolar disorder (BD). Alterations in resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) have been identified in OBP; however, replication has been limited and correlation with person-level risk is unknown. A recent study found reduced rsFC between left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and clusters in the left insula (LINS), lentiform nucleus (LENT), and midcingulate cortex (MCING) in OBP (Roberts et al.

Brain Markers of Familial Risk for Depression: Steps Toward Clinical Relevance?

An important goal in the field of psychiatry is to identify individuals at risk for major psychopathology, prior to actual onset of disorder. Discovery of risk markers that predict onset of disorder, if they are sensitive and specific, could help in the process of early diagnosis, and ultimately lead to improved early intervention and prevention. This is especially a key aspiration for disorders that take a tremendous toll on health and functioning in both adolescence and adulthood, including depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia.

Assessment of a Person-Level Risk Calculator to Predict New-Onset Bipolar Spectrum Disorder in Youth at Familial Risk.

Importance: Early identification of individuals at high risk for the onset of bipolar spectrum disorder (BPSD) is key from both a clinical and research perspective. While previous work has identified the presence of a bipolar prodrome, the predictive implications for the individual have not been assessed, to date.

Objective: To build a risk calculator to predict the 5-year onset of BPSD in youth at familial risk for BPSD.

Longitudinal cognitive trajectories and associated clinical variables in youth with bipolar disorder.

Objective: There is substantial interest in delineating the course of cognitive functioning in bipolar (BP) youth. However, there are no longitudinal studies aimed at defining subgroups of BP youth based on their distinctive cognitive trajectories and their associated clinical variables.

Method: Cognitive functioning was measured in 135 participants from the Course and Outcome of BP Youth (COBY) study using several subtests of the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB).