Click on [Article] below each publication to view the abstract and relevant links!

2016

+ Quevedo, K., Martin, J., Scott, H., Smyda, G., & Pfeifer, J. H. (2016). The neurobiology of self-knowledge in depressed and self-injurious youth. Psychiatry Research: Neuroimaging, 254, 145-155. doi: 10.1016/j.pscychresns.2016.06.015

There is limited information regarding the neurobiology underlying non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) in clinically-referred youth. However, the salience of disturbed interpersonal relationships and disrupted self-processing associated with NSSI suggests the neural basis of social processes as a key area for additional study. Adolescent participants (N=123; M=14.75 years, SD=1.64) were divided into three groups: NSSI plus depression diagnosis (NSSI), depression only (DEP), healthy controls (HC). In the scanner, participants completed an Interpersonal Self-Processing task by taking direct (own) and indirect (mothers', best friends', or classmates') perspectives regarding self-characteristics. Across all perspectives, NSSI showed higher BOLD activation in limbic areas, and anterior and posterior cortical midline structures versus DEP and HC, while HC showed greater activity in rostrolateral, frontal pole and occipital cortex than NSSI and DEP youth. Moreover, NSSI youth showed heightened responses in amygdala, hippocampus, parahippocampus, and fusiform when taking their mothers' perspective, which were negatively correlated with self-reports of the mother's support of adolescents' emotional distress in the NSSI group. NSSI youth also yielded greater precuneus and posterior cingulate cortex activity during indirect self-processing from their classmates' perspective. Findings suggest a role for disruptions in self- and emotion-processing, and conflicted social relationships in the neurobiology of NSSI among depressed adolescents. [Article].

+ Flournoy, J. C., Pfeifer, J. H., Moore, W. E. III, Tackman, A., Mazziotta, J. C., Iacoboni, M., & Dapretto, M. (2016). Neural Reactivity to Emotional Faces May Mediate the Relationship Between Childhood Empathy and Adolescent Prosocial Behavior. Child Development, 87(6), 1691-1702.

Reactivity to others' emotions can result in empathic concern (EC), an important motivator of prosocial behavior, but can also result in personal distress (PD), which may hinder prosocial behavior. Examining neural substrates of emotional reactivity may elucidate how EC and PD differentially influence prosocial behavior. Participants (N=57) provided measures of EC, PD, prosocial behavior, and neural responses to emotional expressions at age 10 and 13. Initial EC predicted subsequent prosocial behavior. Initial EC and PD predicted subsequent reactivity to emotions in the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and inferior parietal lobule, respectively. Activity in the IFG, a region linked to mirror neuron processes, as well as cognitive control and language, mediated the relation between initial EC and subsequent prosocial behavior.

Keywords: empathy, mirror neuron system, prosocial behavior [Article].

+ Tackman, A. M., Srivastava, S., Pfeifer, J. H., & Dapretto, M. (2016). Development of conscientiousness in childhood and adolescence: Typical trajectories and associations with academic, health, and relationship changes. Journal of Research in Personality. doi:10.1016/j.jrp.2016.05.002

Conscientiousness is related to a range of important life outcomes, so it is important to understand its development early in life. We examined how conscientiousness changes from late childhood through middle adolescence and what other psychosocial changes it co-occurs with. We developed and validated a conscientiousness scale for use in existing data. Then in a longitudinal study of participants at ages 10, 13, and 16 (N = 90 at Time 1) we used growth curve modeling to examine how conscientiousness co-develops with academic, health, and relationship functioning. Mean levels of conscientiousness decreased from 10 to 13 and then increased to age 16. The later increase was stronger among females. Changes in conscientiousness were associated with adaptive changes in other variables. [Article].

+ Pfeifer, J. H., & Allen, N. B. (2016). The audacity of specificity: Moving adolescent developmental neuroscience towards more powerful scientific paradigms and translatable models. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 17, 131-137. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.dcn.2015.12.012

[Article].

2018

+ Crone, E. A., & Pfeifer, J. H. (2018). What happens in emotional development? Adolescent emotionality. In A. Fox, R. Lapate, A. Shackman, & R. Davidson (Eds.), The Nature of Emotion, 2nd Ed.

+ ^Op de Macks, Z. A. O., ^Flannery, J. E., Peake, S. J., Flournoy, J. C., Mobasser, A., Alberti, S. L., … & Pfeifer, J. H. (2018). Novel insights from the Yellow Light Game: Safe and risky decisions differentially impact adolescent outcome-related brain function. NeuroImage, 181, 568-581.

Changes across the span of adolescence in the adolescent reward system are thought to increase the tendency to take risks. While developmental differences in decision and outcome-related reward processes have been studied extensively, existing paradigms have largely neglected to measure how different types of decisions modulate reward-related outcome processes. We modified an existing decision-making paradigm (the Stoplight Task; Chein et al., 2011) to create a flexible laboratory measure of decision-making and outcome processing, including the ability to assess modulatory effects of safe versus risky decisions on reward-related outcome processes: the Yellow Light Game (YLG). We administered the YLG in the MRI scanner to 81 adolescents, ages 11–17 years, recruited from the community. Results showed that nucleus accumbens activation was enhanced for (1) risky > safe decisions, (2) positive > negative outcomes, and (3) outcomes following safe decisions compared to outcomes following risky decisions, regardless of whether these outcomes were positive or negative. Outcomes following risky decisions (compared to outcomes following safe decisions) were associated with enhanced activity in cortical midline structures. Furthermore, while there were no developmental differences in risk-taking behavior, more pubertally mature adolescents showed enhanced nucleus accumbens activation during positive > negative outcomes. These findings suggest that outcome processing is modulated by the types of decisions made by adolescents and highlight the importance of investigating processes involved in safe as well as risky decisions to better understand the adolescent tendency to take risks.

Keywords: fMRI, Risk taking, Adolescence, Reward, Ventral striatum, Driving game [Article].

+ Pfeifer, J. H., & Berkman, E. T. (2018). Self and identity development in adolescence: Neural evidence and implications for a value-based choice perspective on motivated behavior. Child Development Perspectives. doi: doi/10.1111/cdep.12279

Following a key developmental task of childhood—building a foundation of self-knowledge in the form of domain-specific self-concepts—adolescents begin to explore their emerging identities in ways that foster autonomy and connectedness. Neuroimaging studies of self-related processes demonstrate enhanced engagement of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (PFC) in adolescence, which may facilitate and reflect the development of identity by integrating the value of potential actions and choices. Drawing from neuroeconomic and social-cognitive accounts, we propose that motivated behavior during adolescence can be modeled by a general value-based decision-making process centered around value accumulation in the ventromedial PFC. This approach advances models of adolescent neurodevelopment that focus on reward sensitivity and cognitive control by considering more diverse value inputs, including contributions of developing self- and identity-related processes. It also considers adolescent decision making and behavior from adolescents' point of view rather than adults' perspectives on what adolescents should value or how they should behave. [Article].

+ Telzer, E. H., McCormick, E. M., Peters, S., Cosme, D., Pfeifer, J. H., & van Duijvenvoorde, A. C. (2018). Methodological considerations for developmental longitudinal fMRI research. Developmental cognitive neuroscience, 33, 149-160.

There has been a large spike in longitudinal fMRI studies in recent years, and so it is essential that researchers carefully assess the limitations and challenges afforded by longitudinal designs. In this article, we provide an overview of important considerations for longitudinal fMRI research in developmental samples, including task design, sampling strategies, and group-level analyses. We first discuss considerations for task designs, weighing the pros and cons of many commonly used tasks, as well as outlining how the tasks may be impacted by repeated exposure. Secondly, we review the types of group-level analyses that can be conducted on longitudinal fMRI data, analyses which must account for repeated measures. Finally, we review and critique recent longitudinal studies that have emerged in the past few years. [Article].

+ Madhyastha, T., Peverill, M., Koh, N., McCabe, C., Flournoy, J., Mills, K., … & McLaughlin, K. A. (2018). Current methods and limitations for longitudinal fMRI analysis across development. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 33, 118-128.

The human brain is remarkably plastic. The brain changes dramatically across development, with ongoing functional development continuing well into the third decade of life and substantial changes occurring again in older age. Dynamic changes in brain function are thought to underlie the innumerable changes in cognition, emotion, and behavior that occur across development. The brain also changes in response to experience, which raises important questions about how the environment influences the developing brain. Longitudinal functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies are an essential means of understanding these developmental changes and their cognitive, emotional, and behavioral correlates. This paper provides an overview of common statistical models of longitudinal change applicable to developmental cognitive neuroscience, and a review of the functionality provided by major software packages for longitudinal fMRI analysis. We demonstrate that there are important developmental questions that cannot be answered using available software. We propose alternative approaches for addressing problems that are commonly faced in modeling developmental change with fMRI data. [Article].

+ Alarcon, G., Pfeifer, J. H., Fair, D. A., & Nagel, B. J. (2018). Adolescent Gender Differences in Cognitive Control Performance and Functional Connectivity Between Default Mode and Fronto-Parietal Networks Within a Self-Referential Context. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 12, 73.

Ineffective reduction of functional connectivity between the default mode network (DMN) and frontoparietal network (FPN) during cognitive control can interfere with performance in healthy individuals—a phenomenon present in psychiatric disorders, such as depression. Here, this mechanism is studied in healthy adolescents by examining gender differences in task-regressed functional connectivity using functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and a novel task designed to place the DMN—supporting self-referential processing (SRP)—and FPN—supporting cognitive control—into conflict. Compared to boys, girls showed stronger functional connectivity between DMN and FPN during cognitive control in an SRP context (n = 40; boys = 20), a context that also elicited more errors of omission in girls. The gender difference in errors of omission was mediated by higher self-reported co-rumination—the extensive and repetitive discussion of problems and focus on negative feelings with a same-gender peer—by girls, compared to boys. These findings indicate that placing internal and external attentional demands in conflict lead to persistent functional connectivity between FPN and DMN in girls, but not boys; however, deficits in performance during this context were explained by co-rumination, such that youth with higher co-rumination displayed the largest performance deficits. Previous research shows that co-rumination predicts depressive symptoms during adolescence; thus, gender differences in the mechanisms involved with transitioning from internal to external processing may be relevant for understanding heightened vulnerability for depression in adolescent girls.

Keywords: adolescence, self-referential processing, cognitive control, gender differences, co-rumination, functional magnetic resonance imaging, default mode network, fronto-parietal network [Article].

+ Cosme, D. C., Mobasser, A., Zeithamova, D., Berkman, E. T., & Pfeifer, J. H. (2018). Choosing to regulate: Does choice enhance craving regulation? Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 13, 300-309. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsy010.

Goal-directed behavior and lifelong well-being often depend on the ability to control appetitive motivations, such as cravings. Cognitive reappraisal is an effective way to modulate emotional states, including cravings, but is often studied under explicit instruction to regulate. Despite the strong prediction from Self-Determination Theory that choice should enhance task engagement and regulation success, little is known empirically about whether and how regulation is different when participants choose (vs are told) to exert control. To investigate how choice affects neural activity and regulation success, participants reappraised their responses to images of personally-craved foods while undergoing functional neuroimaging. Participants were either instructed to view or reappraise (‘no-choice’) or chose freely to view or reappraise (‘yes-choice’). Choice increased activity in the frontoparietal control network. We expected this activity would be associated with increased task engagement, resulting in better regulation success. However, contrary to this prediction, choice slightly reduced regulation success. Follow-up multivariate functional neuroimaging analyses indicated that choice likely disrupted allocation of limited cognitive resources during reappraisal. While unexpected, these results highlight the importance of studying upstream processes such as regulation choice, as they may affect the ability to regulate cravings and other emotional states.

Keywords: craving regulation, cognitive reappraisal, choice, autonomy, self-determination [Article].

+ Vijayakumar, N., Op de Macks, Z., Shirtcliff, E. A., & Pfeifer, J. H. (2018). Puberty and the human brain: Insights into adolescent development. Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, 92, 417-436. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2018.06.004

Alongside the exponential flourish of research on age-related trajectories of human brain development during childhood and adolescence in the past two decades, there has been an increase in the body of work examining the association between pubertal development and brain maturation. This review systematically examines empirical research on puberty-related structural and functional brain development in humans, with the aim of identifying convergent patterns of associations. We emphasize longitudinal studies, and discuss pervasive but oft-overlooked methodological issues that may be contributing to inconsistent findings and hindering progress (e.g., conflating distinct pubertal indices and different measurement instruments). We also briefly evaluate support for prominent models of adolescent neurodevelopment that hypothesize puberty-related changes in brain regions involved in affective and motivational processes. For the field to progress, replication studies are needed to help resolve current inconsistencies and gain a clearer understanding of pubertal associations with brain development in humans, knowledge that is crucial to make sense of the changes in psychosocial functioning, risk behavior, and mental health during adolescence.

Keywords: Adolescence; Brain development; Functional MRI; Hormones; Puberty; Structural MRI. [Article].

+ Jankowski, K. F., Batres, J., Smyda, G., Pfeifer, J. H., & Quevedo, K. (2018). Feeling left out: Depressed adolescents atypically recruit emotional salience and regulation networks during social exclusion. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 13, 863-876. doi: 10.1093/scan/nsy055

Depression is associated with negative attention and attribution biases and maladaptive emotion responsivity and regulation, which adversely impact self-evaluations and interpersonal relationships. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we investigated the neural substrates of these impairments. We compared neural activity recruited by 126 clinically depressed and healthy adolescents (ages 11–17 years) during social exclusion (Exclusion > Inclusion) using Cyberball. Results revealed significant interaction effects within left anterior insula (AI)/inferior frontal gyrus and left middle temporal gyrus. Insula hyperresponsivity was associated with peer exclusion for depressed adolescents but peer inclusion for healthy adolescents. In additional, healthy adolescents recruited greater lateral temporal activity during peer exclusion. Complementary effect size analyses within independent parcellations offered converging evidence, as well as highlighted medium-to-large effects within subgenual/ventral anterior cingulate cortex and lateral prefrontal, lateral temporal and lateral parietal regions implicated in emotion regulation. Depressogenic neural patterns were associated with negative self-perceptions and negative information processing biases. These findings suggest a neural mechanism underlying cognitive biases in depression, as reflected by emotional hyperresponsivity and maladaptive regulation/reappraisal of negative social evaluative information. This study lends further support for salience and central executive network dysfunction underlying social threat processing, and in particular, highlights the anterior insula as a key region of disturbance in adolescent depression.

Keywords: social exclusion, fMRI, depression, adolescence, emotion regulation, salience [Article].

+ Alarcon, G., Pfeifer, J. H., Fair, D. A., & Nagel, B. J. (2018). Adolescent gender differences in cognitive control performance and functional connectivity between default mode and fronto-parietal networks within a self-referential context. Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, 12, 73. doi: 10.3389/fnbeh.2018.00073

Ineffective reduction of functional connectivity between the default mode network (DMN) and frontoparietal network (FPN) during cognitive control can interfere with performance in healthy individuals—a phenomenon present in psychiatric disorders, such as depression. Here, this mechanism is studied in healthy adolescents by examining gender differences in task-regressed functional connectivity using functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and a novel task designed to place the DMN—supporting self-referential processing (SRP)—and FPN—supporting cognitive control—into conflict. Compared to boys, girls showed stronger functional connectivity between DMN and FPN during cognitive control in an SRP context (n = 40; boys = 20), a context that also elicited more errors of omission in girls. The gender difference in errors of omission was mediated by higher self-reported co-rumination—the extensive and repetitive discussion of problems and focus on negative feelings with a same-gender peer—by girls, compared to boys. These findings indicate that placing internal and external attentional demands in conflict lead to persistent functional connectivity between FPN and DMN in girls, but not boys; however, deficits in performance during this context were explained by co-rumination, such that youth with higher co-rumination displayed the largest performance deficits. Previous research shows that co-rumination predicts depressive symptoms during adolescence; thus, gender differences in the mechanisms involved with transitioning from internal to external processing may be relevant for understanding heightened vulnerability for depression in adolescent girls. [Article].

2019

+ Vijayakumar N, Pfeifer JH, Flournoy JC, Hernandez LM, Dapretto M. Affective reactivity during adolescence: Associations with age, puberty and testosterone. Cortex. 2019 Aug;117:336-350. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2019.04.024. Epub 2019 May 17. PMID: 31200127; PMCID: PMC7057923.

Adolescence is a period of heightened social engagement that is accompanied by normative changes in neural reactivity to affective stimuli. It is also a period of concurrent endocrine and physical changes associated with puberty. A growing body of research suggests that hormonal shifts during adolescence impact brain development, but minimal research in humans has examined the relationship between intra-individual changes in puberty and brain function. The current study examines linear and nonlinear changes in affective reactivity in a longitudinal sample of 82 adolescents who underwent three fMRI sessions between the ages of 9 and 18 years. Changes in response to affective facial stimuli were related to age, pubertal stage, and testosterone levels. Using multilevel modeling, we highlight extensive nonlinear development of socio-emotional responsivity across the brain. Results include mid-pubertal peaks in amygdala and hippocampus response to fearful expressions, as well as sex differences in regions subserving social and self-evaluative processes. However, testosterone levels exhibited inverse patterns of association with neural response compared to pubertal stage in females (e.g., U-shaped relationship with the amygdala and hippocampus). Findings highlight potentially unique roles of age, pubertal stage and testosterone on socio-emotional development during adolescence, as well as sex differences in these associations. [Article].

+ Flannery, J., Callaghan, B., Sharpton, T., Fisher, P., & Pfeifer, J. (2019). Is adolescence the missing developmental link in Microbiome–Gut–Brain axis communication?. Developmental psychobiology. 61(5), 783–795.

Gut microbial research has recently opened new frontiers in neuroscience and potentiated novel therapies for mental health problems (Mayer, et al., 2014). Much of our understanding of the gut microbiome's role in brain function and behavior, however, has been largely derived from research on nonhuman animals. Even less is known about how the development of the gut microbiome influences critical periods of neural and behavioral development, particularly adolescence. In this review, we first discuss why the gut microbiome has become increasingly relevant to developmental cognitive neuroscience and provide a synopsis of the known connections of the gut microbiome with social-affective brain function and behavior, specifically highlighting human developmental work when possible. We then focus on adolescence, a key period of neurobiological and social-affective development. Specifically, we review the links between the gut microbiome and six overarching domains of change during adolescence: (a) social processes, (b) motivation and behavior, (c) neural development, (d) cognition, (e) neuroendocrine function, and (f) physical health and wellness. Using a developmental science perspective, we summarize key changes across these six domains to underscore the promise for the gut microbiome to bidirectionally influence and transform adolescent development. [Article].

+ Ferschmann, L., Vijayakumar, N., Grydeland, H., Overbye, K., Sederevicius, D., Due-Tønnessen, P., Fjell, A. M., Walhovd, K. B., Pfeifer, J. H., & Tamnes, C. K. (2019). Prosocial behavior relates to the rate and timing of cortical thinning from adolescence to young adulthood. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 40, 100734.

Prosocial behavior, or voluntary actions that intentionally benefit others, relate to desirable developmental outcomes such as peer acceptance, while lack of prosocial behavior has been associated with several neurodevelopmental disorders. Mapping the biological foundations of prosociality may thus aid our understanding of both normal and abnormal development, yet how prosociality relates to cortical development is largely unknown. Here, relations between prosociality, as measured by the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (self-report), and changes in thickness across the cortical mantle were examined using mixed-effects models. The sample consisted of 169 healthy individuals (92 females) aged 12–26 with repeated MRI from up to 3 time points, at approximately 3-year intervals (301 scans). In regions associated with social cognition and behavioral control, higher prosociality was associated with greater cortical thinning during early-to-middle adolescence, followed by attenuation of this process during the transition to young adulthood. Comparatively, lower prosociality was related to initially slower thinning, followed by comparatively protracted thinning into the mid-twenties. This study showed that prosocial behavior is associated with regional development of cortical thickness in adolescence and young adulthood. The results suggest that the rate of thinning in these regions, as well as its timing, may be factors related to prosocial behavior. [Article].

+ Van der Cruijsen, R., Peters, S., Zoetendaal, K. P. M., Pfeifer, J. H., & Crone, E. A. (2019). Direct and reflected self-concept show increasing similarity across adolescence: A functional neuroimaging study. Neuropsychologia, 129, 407–417. doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2019.05.001

In adolescence, the perceived opinions of others are important in the construction of one's self-concept. Previous studies found involvement of medial Prefrontal Cortex (mPFC) and temporal-parietal junction (TPJ) in direct (own perspective) and reflected (perceived perspective of others) self-evaluations, but no studies to date examined differences in these processes across adolescence. In this study, 150 adolescents between 11 and 21 years old evaluated their traits from their own perspective and from the perceived perspective of peers in a fMRI session. Results showed overlapping behavioural and neural measures for direct and reflected self-evaluations, in mPFC, precuneus and right TPJ. The difference in behavioural ratings declined with age, and this pattern was mirrored by activity in the mPFC, showing a diminishing difference in activation for direct > reflected self-evaluations with increasing age. Right TPJ was engaged more strongly for reflected > direct evaluations in adolescents who were less positive about themselves, and those who showed who showed less item-by-item agreement between direct and reflected self-evaluations. Together, the results suggest that the internalization of others' opinions in constructing a self-concept occurs on both the behavioural and neural levels across adolescence, which may aid in developing a stable self-concept. [Article].

+ Pfeifer, J. H., Allen, N. B., Byrne, M. L., & Mills, K. L. (2018). Modeling Developmental Change: Contemporary Approaches to Key Methodological Challenges in Developmental Neuroimaging. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 33, 1-4. doi: 10.1016/j.dcn.2018.10.001.

Developmental cognitive neuroscience is a truly interdisciplinary field of research that has the potential to answer critical questions about neural plasticity and neural substrates of learning and behavior across cognitive, affective, and social domains of functioning. It therefore has the potential to not only help us understand trajectories and mechanisms of typical development, but also translate this knowledge to the prevention and treatment of emerging psychopathology and health-risking behaviors. However, to reach these goals our field must be able to model how these processes change within individuals across time. Given how central this methodological issue is to our endeavours, it is surprising that there has been relatively little attention paid to integrating neuroscientific methods with cutting edge statistical techniques for modelling longitudinal change, nor have there been published methodological guidelines on many relevant topics. The current special issue sets out to begin to address this lacuna. [Article].

+ Telzer, E. H., McCormack, E., Peters, S., Cosme, D. C., Pfeifer, J. H., & van Duijvenvoorde, A. (2018). Methodological considerations for developmental longitudinal fMRI research. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 33, 149-160. doi: 10.1016/j.dcn.2018.02.004

There has been a large spike in longitudinal fMRI studies in recent years, and so it is essential that researchers carefully assess the limitations and challenges afforded by longitudinal designs. In this article, we provide an overview of important considerations for longitudinal fMRI research in developmental samples, including task design, sampling strategies, and group-level analyses. We first discuss considerations for task designs, weighing the pros and cons of many commonly used tasks, as well as outlining how the tasks may be impacted by repeated exposure. Secondly, we review the types of group-level analyses that can be conducted on longitudinal fMRI data, analyses which must account for repeated measures. Finally, we review and critique recent longitudinal studies that have emerged in the past few years. [Article].

2020

+ Pfeifer, J. H., & Allen, N. B. (2020). Puberty initiates cascading relationships between neurodevelopmental, social, and internalizing processes across adolescence. Biological Psychiatry. Advance online publication.

Adolescence is a period of dramatic developmental transitions—from puberty-related changes in hormones, bodies, and brains to an increasingly complex social world. The concurrent increase in the onset of many mental disorders has prompted the search for key developmental processes that drive changes in risk for psychopathology during this period of life. Hormonal surges and consequent physical maturation linked to pubertal development in adolescence are thought to affect multiple aspects of brain development, social cognition, and peer relations, each of which have also demonstrated associations with risk for mood and anxiety disorders. These puberty-related effects may combine with other nonpubertal influences on brain maturation to transform adolescents’ social perception and experiences, which in turn continue to shape both mental health and brain development through transactional processes. In this review, we focus on pubertal, neural, and social changes across the duration of adolescence that are known or thought to be related to adolescent-emergent disorders, specifically depression, anxiety, and deliberate self-harm (nonsuicidal self-injury). We propose a theoretical model in which social processes (both social cognition and peer relations) are critical to understanding the way in which pubertal development drives neural and psychological changes that produce potential mental health vulnerabilities, particularly (but not exclusively) in adolescent girls. [Article].

+ Barendse, M.E.A, Vijayakumar, N., Byrne, M.L. , Flannery, J.E., Cheng, T.W., Flournoy, J.C., Nelson, B.W., Cosme, D., Mobasser, A., Chavez, S.J., Hval, L., Brady, B., Nadel, H., Helzer, A., Shirtcliff, E.A., Allen, N.B., Pfeifer, J.H. (2020). Study Protocol: Transitions in Adolescent Girls (TAG). Frontiers in Psychiatry 10:1018.

Background: Despite recent studies linking pubertal processes to brain development, as well as research demonstrating the importance of both pubertal and neurodevelopmental processes for adolescent mental health, there is limited knowledge of the full pathways and mechanisms behind the emergence of mental illnesses such as depression and anxiety disorders in adolescence. The Transitions in Adolescent Girls (TAG) study aims to understand the complex relationships between pubertal development, brain structure and connectivity, the behavioral and neural correlates of social and self-perception processes, and adolescent mental health in female adolescents.

Methods: The TAG study includes 174 female adolescents aged 10.0 to 13.0 years, recruited from the local community in Lane County, Oregon, USA. The participants, along with a parent/guardian, will complete three waves of assessment over the course of 3 years; the third wave is currently underway. Each wave includes collection of four saliva samples (one per week) and one hair sample for the assessment of hormone levels and immune factors; an MRI session including structural, diffusion, resting-state functional and task-based functional scans; the Kiddie Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia (K-SADS), a diagnostic interview on current and lifetime mental health; production of a short self-narrative video; and measurement of height, weight, and waist circumference. The functional MRI tasks include a self-evaluation paradigm and a self-disclosure paradigm. In addition, adolescents and their parents/guardians complete a number of surveys to report on the adolescent's pubertal development, mental health, social environment and life events; adolescents also report on various indices of self-perception and social-emotional functioning.

Discussion: The knowledge gained from this study will include developmental trajectories of pubertal, neurological, and social processes and their roles as mechanisms in predicting emergence of mental illness in female adolescents. This knowledge will help identify modifiable, developmentally specific risk factors as targets for early intervention and prevention efforts. [Article].

+ Barendse, M.E.A., Cosme, D., Flournoy, J. C., Vijayakumar, N., Cheng, T. W., Allen, N. B., & Pfeifer, J. H. (2020). Neural correlates of self-evaluation in relation to age and pubertal development in early adolescent girls. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 44, 100799.

Early adolescence is marked by puberty, and is also a time of flux in self-perception. However, there is limited research on the neural correlates of self-evaluation in relation to pubertal development. The current study examined relationships between neural activation during self-evaluation of social traits and maturation (age and pubertal development) in a community sample of female adolescents. Participants (N = 143; age M = 11.65, range = 10.0–13.0) completed a functional MRI task in which they judged the self-descriptiveness of adjectives for prosocial, antisocial and social status-related traits. Pubertal development was based on self-report, and was also examined using morning salivary testosterone, dehydroepiandrosterone, and estradiol. Contrary to preregistered hypotheses, neither age nor pubertal development were related to neural activation during self-evaluation. We further examined whether activation in two regions-of-interest, the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) and perigenual anterior cingulate (pgACC), was associated with trial-level self-evaluative behavior. In line with preregistered hypotheses, higher vmPFC and pgACC activation during self-evaluation were both associated with a higher probability of endorsing negative adjectives, and a lower probability of endorsing positive adjectives. Future studies should examine neural trajectories of self-evaluation longitudinally, and investigate the predictive value of the neural correlates of self-evaluation for adolescent mental health. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved) [Article] [Preregistration]

+ Flournoy, J.C., Vijayakumar, N., Cheng, T. W., Cosme, D., Flannery, J.E., Pfeifer, J. H. (2020). Improving practices and inferences in developmental cognitive neuroscience. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 45, 100807.

The past decade has seen growing concern about research practices in cognitive neuroscience, and psychology more broadly, that shake our confidence in many inferences in these fields. We consider how these issues affect developmental cognitive neuroscience, with the goal of progressing our field to support strong and defensible inferences from our neurobiological data. This manuscript focuses on the importance of distinguishing between confirmatory versus exploratory data analysis approaches in developmental cognitive neuroscience. Regarding confirmatory research, we discuss problems with analytic flexibility, appropriately instantiating hypotheses, and controlling the error rate given how we threshold data and correct for multiple comparisons. To counterbalance these concerns with confirmatory analyses, we present two complementary strategies. First, we discuss the advantages of working within an exploratory analysis framework, including estimating and reporting effect sizes, using parcellations, and conducting specification curve analyses. Second, we summarize defensible approaches for null hypothesis significance testing in confirmatory analyses, focusing on transparent and reproducible practices in our field. Specific recommendations are given, and templates, scripts, or other resources are hyperlinked, whenever possible. [Article].

+ Vijayakumar, N., Flournoy, J.C., Mills, K.L., Cheng, T.W., Mobasser, A., Flannery, J.E., Allen, N.B. and Pfeifer, J.H. (2020). Getting to know you: An fMRI study of self-disclosure to friends during adolescence. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

Adolescence is often defined as a period of social reorientation, characterized by increased engagement with, and reliance on, same-aged peers. Consistent with these shifting motivations, we hypothesized that communicating information about oneself to friends would be intrinsically valued during adolescence. We also examined behavioral and neural differences when sharing information of varying depth in intimacy. These questions were investigated in a sample of early adolescent girls (N = 125, ages 10.0-13.0 years) who completed an fMRI adaptation of a monetary choice task on self-disclosure. Behaviorally, adolescents gave up money to share self-referential information with (real-life) close friends, and neural analyses identified extensive engagement of regions that support reward, social cognition and emotion regulation when engaging in disclosure. Behavioral and neural valuation of sharing superficial information were related to individual differences in self-worth and friendship quality. Comparatively, across all levels of analyses, adolescents were less likely to share intimate information. Findings highlight both the value and costs associated with self-disclosure during this time of increased peer sensitivity. [Article] [Preprint].

+ Vijayakumar, N., & Pfeifer, J. H. (2020). Self-disclosure during adolescence: exploring the means, targets, and types of personal exchanges. Current Opinion in Psychology, 31, 135–140.

Sharing information about oneself, or self-disclosing, is a fundamental interpersonal process that facilitates the attainment of key developmental milestones during adolescence. Changes in self-disclosure behaviors may reflect or support the social reorientation that sees children become increasingly reliant on peers for social and emotional support. Neuroimaging research has highlighted protracted maturation of the structure and function of brain regions that support social cognitive and reward processes underlying self-disclosure during adolescence. This review explores behavioral and neural trends in self-disclosure during adolescence, including research that uses novel experimental paradigms to extend the field beyond self-report measures. Findings show that certain aspects of self-disclosure behavior have adapted to changing social environments, but they remain intrinsically valued across the adolescent period and are essential for relationship development, identity formation and overall self-worth and well-being. [Article].

+ ^Cheng, T. W., ^Vijayakumar, N., Flournoy, J. C., Peake, S. J., Flannery, J. E., Mobasser, A., Fisher, P. A., & Pfeifer, J. H. (2020). Feeling left out or just surprised? Neural correlates of social exclusion and overinclusion in adolescence. Cognitive, Affective & Behavioral Neuroscience, 20(2), 340–355.

Social belonging is an important human drive that influences mood and behavior. Neural responses to social exclusion are well-characterized, but the specificity of these responses to processing rejection-related affective distress is unknown. The present study compares neural responses to exclusion and overinclusion, a condition that similarly violates fairness expectations but does not involve rejection, with a focus on implications for models of dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC) and anterior insula (AI) function. In an fMRI adaptation of the Cyberball paradigm with adolescents aged 11.1-17.7 years (N = 69), we employed parametric modulators to examine scaling of neural signal with cumulative exclusion and inclusion events, an approach that overcomes arbitrary definitions of condition onsets/offsets imposed on fluid, continuous gameplay. We identified positive scaling of dACC and posterior insula response with cumulative exclusion events, but these same regions exhibited trending signal decreases with cumulative inclusion events. Furthermore, areas within the dACC and insula also responded to context incongruency (throws to the participant in the exclusion run; throws between computer players in the overinclusion run). These findings caution against interpretations that responses in these regions uniquely reflect the affective distress of exclusion within social interaction paradigms. We further identified that the left ventrolateral PFC, rostromedial PFC, and left intraparietal sulcus responded similarly to cumulative exclusion and inclusion. These findings shed light on which neural regions exhibit patterns of differential sensitivity to exclusion or overinclusion, as well as those that are more broadly engaged by both types of social interaction. [Article].

+ Pfeifer, J. H., & Weston, S. J. (2020). Developmental cognitive neuroscience initiatives for advancements in methodological approaches: Registered Reports and Next-Generation Tools. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 44, 100755.

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience is excited to introduce two new article types at the journal, effective May 15, 2020: Next-Gen Tools and Registered Reports. Next-Gen Tools provide an outlet for methodological advancements and best practices in developmental cognitive neuroscience. Registered Reports provide the opportunity for peer review of study protocol, including hypotheses and methods, prior to data collection or analysis. As many articles have been written about this important tool for open science, we focus on topics we believe are of particular relevance to developmental cognitive neuroscientists. One emphasis is on what are called registered reports of secondary data analysis, that is, proposals to analyze data that have already been collected. Given the wide-spread use of longitudinal methods and pre-existing data in the field, we believe this type of registered report will be common, perhaps the majority of this submission type at DCN. We also present potential challenges for registered reports in developmental cognitive neuroscience and suggest possible solutions, in an effort to facilitate the adoption of this approach. Both article types will also appear as ongoing virtual special sections. [Article].

+ Nelson, B. W., Sheeber, L., Pfeifer, J. H., & Allen, N. B. (2020). Psychobiological Markers of Allostatic Load in Depressed and Non-Depressed Mothers and Their Adolescent Offspring. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. Advance online publication.

Background A substantial body of research has emerged suggesting that depression is strongly linked to poor physical health outcomes, which may be partly due to increased allostatic load across stress response systems. Interestingly, health risks associated with depression are also borne by the offspring of depressed persons. Our aim was to simultaneously investigate whether maternal depression is associated not only with increased allostatic load across cardiac control, inflammation, cellular aging, but also if this is transmitted to adolescent children, possibly increasing the risk for early onset of psychiatric conditions and disease in these offspring.

Methods A preregistered, case–control study of 180 low-income mothers (50% mothers depressed, 50% mothers nondepressed) and their adolescent offspring was conducted to determine how depressed mothers and their adolescent offspring systematically differ in terms of autonomic, sympathetic, and parasympathetic cardiac control; inflammation; cellular aging; and behavioral health in offspring, which are indicators suggestive of higher allostatic load.

Results Findings indicate that depressed mothers and their adolescent offspring differ in terms of comorbid mental and physical health risk profiles that are suggestive of higher allostatic load. Findings indicate that depressed mothers exhibit elevated resting heart rate and decreased heart rate variability, and adolescent offspring of depressed mothers exhibit greater mental health symptoms, elevated heart rate, and accelerated biological aging (shorter telomeres). These effects persisted after controlling for a range of potential covariates, including medication use, sex, age, and adolescents’ own mental health symptoms.

Conclusions Findings indicate that maternal depression is associated with increased allostatic load in depressed women and their adolescent children, possibly increasing risk for early onset of psychiatric conditions and disease in these offspring. Future research is needed to delineate why some biological systems are more impacted than others and to explore how findings might inform preventative programs targeted at adolescent offspring of depressed mothers. [Article]. [Preregistration]

+ Andrews, J. A., Mills, K. L., Flournoy, J. C., Flannery, J. E., Mobasser, A., Ross, G., Durnin, M., Peake, S. J., Fisher, P. A., & Pfeifer, J. H. (2020). Rethinking adolescent risk-taking: Perception of social risk impacts expected involvement in health-risk behaviour during adolescence.Journal of Research on Adolescence. Advance online publication.

This study examined how individual differences in expectations of social consequences relate to individuals’ expected involvement in health-risk behaviors (HRBs). A total of 122 adolescents (aged 11–17) reported their expected involvement in a number of risk behaviors and whether or not they expect to be liked more or less by engaging in the behavior: the expected social benefit. Higher perceived social benefit was associated with higher anticipated involvement in said behavior. This relationship was stronger for adolescents who reported a higher degree of peer victimization, supporting the hypothesis that experiencing victimization increases the social value of peer interactions. Findings suggest that adolescents incorporate expectations of social consequences when making decisions regarding their involvement in HRBs. [Article].

+ Gruber, J., Mendle, J., Lindquist, K. A., Schmader, T., Clark, L. A., Bliss-Moreau, E., Akinola, M., Atlas, L., Barch, D. M., Barrett, L. F., Borelli, J. L., Brannon, T. N., Bunge, S. A., Campos, B., Cantlon, J., Carter, R., Carter-Sowell, A. R., Chen, S., Craske, M. G., Cuddy, A., … Williams, L. A. (2020). The Future of Women in Psychological Science. Perspectives on Psychological Science: A Journal of the Association for Psychological Science. Advance online publication.

There has been extensive discussion about gender gaps in representation and career advancement in the sciences. However, psychological science itself has yet to be the focus of discussion or systematic review, despite our field’s investment in questions of equity, status, well-being, gender bias, and gender disparities. In the present article, we consider 10 topics relevant for women’s career advancement in psychological science. We focus on issues that have been the subject of empirical study, discuss relevant evidence within and outside of psychological science, and draw on established psychological theory and social-science research to begin to chart a path forward. We hope that better understanding of these issues within the field will shed light on areas of existing gender gaps in the discipline and areas where positive change has happened, and spark conversation within our field about how to create lasting change to mitigate remaining gender differences in psychological science. [Article].

+ Horn, S. R., Fisher, P. A., Pfeifer, J. H., Allen, N. B., & Berkman, E. T. (2020). Levers and barriers to success in the use of translational neuroscience for the prevention and treatment of mental health and promotion of well-being across the lifespan. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 129(1), 38–48.

Neuroscientific tools and approaches such as neuroimaging, measures of neuroendocrine and psychoneuroimmune activity, and peripheral physiology are increasingly used in clinical science and health psychology research. We define translational neuroscience (TN) as a systematic, theory-driven approach that aims to develop and leverage basic and clinical neuroscientific knowledge to aid the development and optimization of clinical and public health interventions. There is considerable potential across basic and clinical science fields for this approach to provide insights into mental and physical health pathology that had previously been inaccessible. For example, TN might hold the potential to enhance diagnostic specificity, better recognize increased vulnerability in at-risk populations, and augment intervention efficacy. Despite this potential, there has been limited consideration of the advantages and limitations of such an approach. In this article, we articulate extant challenges in defining TN and propose a unifying conceptualization. We illustrate how TN can inform the application of neuroscientific tools to realistically guide clinical research and inform intervention design. We outline specific leverage points of the TN approach and barriers to progress. Ten principles of TN are presented to guide and shape the emerging field. We close by articulating ongoing issues facing TN research. [Article].