College of Behavioral & Social Sciences

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Subject: search.filters.subject.Hippocampus

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Now showing 1 - 5 of 5
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    Early emotional caregiving environment and associations with memory performance and hippocampal volume in adolescents with prenatal drug exposure
    (2023) Kohn, Brooke Hannah; Riggins, Tracy; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Early adversities, including prenatal drug exposure (PDE) and a negative postnatal emotional caregiving environment, impact children’s long-term development. The protracted developmental course of memory and its underlying neural systems offer a valuable framework for understanding the longitudinal associations of pre- and postnatal factors on children with PDE. This study longitudinally examines memory and hippocampal development in 69 parent-child dyads with PDE histories to investigate how the early emotional caregiving environment affects children with PDE’s neural and cognitive systems. Measures of physical health, drug exposure, and the emotional caregiving environment were collected between 0-24 months. At age 14 years, adolescents (N=69, 52.17% Female) completed multiple measures of episodic memory. at ages 14 (n=27) and 18 (n=17) years, a subset of adolescents underwent magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans. Latent constructs of episodic memory and the caregiving environment were created using Confirmatory Factor Analysis. Multiple regressions revealed a negative emotional caregiving environment during infancy was associated with poor memory performance and smaller left hippocampal volumes at 14 years. Better memory performance at 14 years predicted larger right hippocampal volume at 18 years. At 18 years, the association between the emotional caregiving environment and hippocampal volume was moderated by sex, such that a negative emotional caregiving environment was associated with larger left hippocampal volumes in males but not females. Findings suggest that the postnatal caregiving environment may modulate the effects of PDE across development, influencing neurocognitive development.
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    Assessing the Impact of Typical Variations in Stressful Life Events on Hippocampal Development in Childhood
    (2021) Botdorf, Morgan; Riggins, Tracy; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    The negative impact of extreme stress on early brain development is well-documented. An emerging body of work suggests that less extreme and more typical variations in stressful experiences (e.g., parental divorce, changing schools) may also exert an impact on the brain, especially in early childhood; however, more systematic research is needed. Across, three studies, this dissertation addressed this gap by exploring effects of typical variations in stressful life events on development of the hippocampus, a brain region highly susceptible to stress. Study 1a assessed the impact of stressful life events on the development of hippocampal subfield volumes (i.e., CA1, CA2-4/dentate gyrus (DG), subiculum) in an accelerated longitudinal sample of 102 4- or 6-year-old children who were each followed for 3 years. Analyses revealed that experiencing more stressful life events was related to smaller CA1 and CA2-4/DG volumes in the 6- (but not 4-) year-old cohort. Study 1b used the same sample described in Study 1a to investigate the impact of stressful life events on functional connectivity between the hippocampus and stress-related cortical regions. Analyses revealed a significant association in the 4- (but not 6-) year-old cohort, such that experiencing more stressful life events was related to greater connectivity between the hippocampus and the insula, a region important for emotional processing. Study 2 assessed moderating effects of sex and socioeconomic status (SES) on the association between stressful events and hippocampal subfield volumes using a large (n = 4,348), diverse subsample of 9-10-year-old adolescents from the Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development Study. Analyses revealed that stressful life events were related to smaller subiculum volumes, but these associations did not vary by sex or SES. Overall, these findings provide evidence of the impact of typical variations in stressful life events on both hippocampal structure and functional connectivity. Findings also highlight the complexity of stress effects on the brain as these experiences may impact the hippocampus in an age-dependent manner. These results advance our current understanding of how stress influences hippocampal development and pave the way for studies to assess the implications of findings both for cognitive processes and the development of stress-related disorders.
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    Exploring neural correlates of depression in childhood: The relation between amygdala:hippocampus ratios and CDI depression scores in 4-8 year olds
    (2021-05-11) Coley, Katherine; Riggins, Tracy
    Nationally representative studies have shown that mood disorders such as depression and anxiety are widely prevalent in children, with depression acting as one of the leading causes of disability in the United States (Ghandour et al., 2018; Schmaal et al., 2016). Research on adults suggests that depression and mood regulation can be linked to brain structure and function, specifically abnormalities with the amygdala and hippocampus (Yavas et al., 2019; Gerritsen et al., 2012). Interestingly, these brain regions have been shown to undergo structural and functional changes in early childhood that correspond with critical developmental changes in behavior (e.g., Riggins et al., 2018; Stern et al., 2019). Despite these changes, there is very little research investigating the relation between the brain and depressive symptoms in children, particularly during early childhood. Furthering the understanding of the relation between structural changes in brain and depressive symptoms is critically important not only for addressing high rates of childhood depression, but also for understanding the etiology and course of depression from early childhood into adulthood. This information could inform future intervention strategies and improve our understanding of normative and non-normative development in early childhood. This study aims to fill this gap by assessing the association between amygdala and hippocampus volumes and depressive symptoms cross sectionally and longitudinally in children ages 4-8 years.
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    Is nap status related to memory, sleep physiology, and the hippocampus in early childhood?
    (2020) Allard, Tamara L; Riggins, Tracy; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Research suggests there may be links between developmental changes in sleep (e.g., transition out of a nap), memory, and brain (specifically, hippocampus). The purpose of this investigation was to explore differences in sleep physiology, visuospatial memory, and hippocampal volume based on nap status. Participants were 3 to 5-year-old children (n=51) who were habitual nappers (napping >5 days/week), semi-habitual nappers (3–4 days/week), or non-nappers (<2 days/week). Participants completed a memory task before and after a wake and nap session. Polysomnography (PSG) and hippocampal volumes were also assessed. Findings demonstrated that, regardless of nap status, children performed better on a memory task following a nap. PSG revealed that habitual nappers spent marginally more time in nREM2 sleep and less time in SWS compared to semi-habitual nappers. Finally, non-nappers demonstrated a larger hippocampus than the other groups. These findings support the suggestion that developmental differences in these domains are related during childhood.
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    Exploring Differences in Hippocampal Structure between Habitual vs Non-habitual Nappers during Early Childhood
    (2020) Meredith, Lena; Riggins, Tracy
    When we sleep, our memories are consolidated and become less vulnerable to interference, both during overnight sleep and during naps. Previous research in adults suggests this effect is at least partially due to a “transfer” of these memories from the hippocampus to the cortex. Although a similar process likely takes place in young children, there is little research investigating it. The existing literature suggests habitually napping children may need naps more than non-habitually napping children because their brain is less mature. This study aims to examine relations between habitual versus non-habitual nappers and brain development in early childhood. The focus was on the hippocampus, a structure that is critical for memory and shows protected development during early childhood. At the time of this report, 21 children provided useable data (Mage = 4.49 years, SD = 0.51, 9 female). Of these participants, 8 were habitual nappers and 13 were non-habitual nappers. Hippocampal volumes were extracted using a combination of manual and automated methods. Results revealed in the left hippocampal tail, habitual nappers had larger volumes compared to non-habitual nappers. Although these are preliminary results and do not survive correction for multiple comparisons, the findings support that variation in hippocampal development may relate to nap status in developing children. Future research will examine a larger sample size and investigate other brain regions to determine the specificity of these effects.