Common and disorder-specific cortical thickness alterations in internalizing, externalizing and thought disorders during early adolescence: an Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development study.

Background: A growing body of neuroimaging studies has reported common neural abnormalities among mental disorders in adults. However, it is unclear whether the distinct disorder-specific mechanisms operate during adolescence despite the overlap among disorders.

Methods: We studied a large cohort of more than 11 000 preadolescent (age 9-10 yr) children from the Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development cohort.

Neurodevelopmental risk and adaptation as a model for comorbidity among internalizing and externalizing disorders: genomics and cell-specific expression enriched morphometric study.

Background: Comorbidity is the rule rather than the exception for childhood and adolescent onset mental disorders, but we cannot predict its occurrence and do not know the neural mechanisms underlying comorbidity. We investigate if the effects of comorbid internalizing and externalizing disorders on anatomical differences represent a simple aggregate of the effects on each disorder and if these comorbidity-associated cortical surface differences relate to a distinct genetic underpinning.

Methods: We studied the cortical surface area (SA) and thickness (CT) of 11,878 preadolescents (9-10 years) from the Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development Study.