Prenatal maternal Inflammation, childhood cognition and adolescent depressive symptoms.

BACKGROUND: Accumulating evidence indicates that higher prenatal maternal inflammation is associated with increased depression risk in adolescent and adult-aged offspring. Prenatal maternal inflammation (PNMI) may increase the likelihood for offspring to have lower cognitive performance, which, in turn, may heighten risk for depression onset. Therefore, this study explored the potential mediating role of childhood cognitive performance in the relationship between PNMI and adolescent depressive symptoms in offspring. METHODS: Participants included 696 mother-offspring dyads from the Child Health and Development Studies (CHDS) cohort. Biomarkers of maternal inflammation [interleukin (IL)-6, IL-8, IL-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1RA) and soluble TNF receptor-II (sTNF-RII)] were assayed from first (T1) and second trimester (T2) sera. Childhood (ages 9-11) cognitive performance was assessed via standardized Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT), a measure of receptive vocabulary correlated with general intelligence. Adolescent (ages 15-17) depressive symptoms were assessed via self-report. RESULTS: There were no significant associations between T1 biomarkers and childhood PPVT or adolescent depressive symptoms. Higher T2 IL1-RA was directly associated with lower childhood PPVT (b = -0.21, SE = 0.08, t = -2.55, p = 0.01), but not with adolescent depressive symptoms. T2 IL-6 was not directly associated with childhood PPVT, but higher T2 IL-6 was directly associated at borderline significance with greater depressive symptoms in adolescence (b = 0.05, SE = 0.03, t = 1.96, p = 0.05). Lower childhood PPVT predicted significantly higher adolescent depressive symptoms (b = -0.07, SE = 0.02, t = -2.99, p < 0.01). There was a significant indirect effect of T2 IL-1RA on adolescent depressive symptoms via childhood PPVT (b = 0.03, 95 % CI = 0.002-0.03) indicating a partially mediated effect. No significant associations were found with T2 sTNF-RII nor IL-8. CONCLUSIONS: Lower childhood cognitive performance, such as that indicated by a lower PPVT score, represents a potential mechanism through which prenatal maternal inflammation contributes to adolescent depression risk in offspring.

Daily micropractice can augment single-session interventions: A randomized controlled trial of self-compassionate touch and examining their associations with habit formation in US college students.

In this pre-registered study, we evaluated the effects of a single-session, self-guided intervention, leveraging daily micropractice (≤20 seconds/day practice) of self-compassionate touch to enhance self-compassion. We randomly assigned undergraduates (N = 135) to one of two conditions: a single-session intervention in which they were taught self-compassionate touch or a finger-tapping active control. Then, we instructed them to practice for 20 seconds/day for one month. At baseline (T1) and one-month follow-up (T2), participants completed assessments of self-compassion, growth mindset, positive affect, stress, psychopathology, habit formation, and more. In confirmatory, intention-to-treat analyses (N = 135), we found no significant effects on these outcomes. However, in confirmatory, per-protocol analyses (comparing the subsets from each condition who practiced>28 times, N = 45), self-compassionate touch, relative to active control, predicted T1-to-T2 increases in self-compassion (ß = 0.71, p = .025), and reductions in stress (ß = -0.62, p = .047) and psychopathology (ß = -0.61, p = .046). In exploratory intention-to-treat analyses (N = 135), we found the same pattern of effects as in the per-protocol analyses among those who practiced self-compassionate touch more frequently relative to active control. We discuss factors associated with habit formation of daily practice. Daily micropractices have the potential for augmenting single-session interventions and for offering help when more time-intensive approaches may be less accessible. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: NCT05199779.

Using the Beck Depression Inventory to Assess Anhedonia: A Scale Validation Study.

Anhedonia is central to several psychological disorders and a frequent target of psychosocial and pharmacological treatments. We evaluated the psychometric properties of two widely used anhedonia measures derived from the Beck Depression Inventory: a 3-item (BDI-Anh3) and a 4-item version (BDI-Anh4). We evaluated these measures in a large undergraduate sample, a community sample, and a clinical sample. Both the BDI-Anh3 and the BDI-Anh4 showed adequate internal consistency, with BDI-Anh4 performing somewhat better, across the three samples. Both measures showed good convergent and discriminant validity, even after controlling for shared variance with other items on the BDI. These findings indicate that both measures have sufficient reliability and validity to support their use by researchers and clinicians.

What gets in the way of social engagement in schizophrenia?

BACKGROUND: Social engagement-important for health and well-being-can be difficult for people with schizophrenia. Past research indicates that despite expressing interest in social interactions, people with schizophrenia report spending less time with others and feeling lonely. Social motivations and barriers may play an important role for understanding social engagement in schizophrenia. AIM: To investigate how people with schizophrenia describe factors that impede and promote social engagement. METHODS: We interviewed a community sample of people with (n = 35) and without (n = 27) schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder about their social interactions with friends and family over the past week and planned social activities for the coming week. We reviewed the interview transcripts and developed a novel coding system to capture whether interactions occurred, who had initiated the contact, and frequency of reported social barriers (i.e., internal, conflict-based, logistical) and social motivations (i.e., instrumental, affiliative, obligation-based). We also assessed symptoms and functioning. RESULTS: People with schizophrenia were less likely than people without schizophrenia to have spent time with friends [t (51.04) = 2.09, P = 0.042, d = 0.51)], but not family. People with schizophrenia reported more social barriers than people without schizophrenia [F (1, 60) = 10.55, P = 0.002, ηp2 = 0.15)] but did not differ in reported social motivations. Specifically, people with schizophrenia reported more internal [t (45.75) = 3.40, P = 0.001, d = 0.83)] and conflict-based [t (40.11) = 3.03, P = 0.004, d = 0.73)] barriers than people without schizophrenia. Social barriers and motivations were related to real-world social functioning for people with schizophrenia, such that more barriers were associated with more difficulty in close relationships (r = -0.37, P = 0.027) and more motivations were associated with better community functioning (r = 0.38, P = 0.024). CONCLUSION: These findings highlight the importance of assessing first person accounts of social barriers and motivations to better understand social engagement in schizophrenia.

The Future of Women in Psychological Science.

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.

A positive emotion regulation intervention for bipolar I disorder: Treatment development and initial outcomes.

OBJECTIVE: Dysfunction in positive affect is a defining symptom of bipolar I disorder (BD), both during and between mood episodes. We hypothesize that helping people with BD learn skills to create balance in their affective experiences by engaging in strategies that increase low activation positive emotion (LAP; e.g., relaxation) could help to improve well-being during periods of symptom remission. We discuss the development and preliminary outcomes of a positive emotion regulation (PER) group treatment for people with BD, designed as a supplement to pharmacological treatment. METHOD: The Learning Affective Understanding for a Rich Emotional Life (LAUREL) intervention is a group-based intervention covering 10 empirically supported skills designed to increase LAP. Sixteen people with BD enrolled in the LAUREL intervention and twelve completed baseline and post-intervention assessments. RESULTS: Participants who completed the study (n = 12) attended the majority of groups (87.96%) and reported practicing skills, on average, 16 times a week. We were unable to detect significant differences in mania symptoms following engagement in this PER intervention. Finally, participants reported increases in several areas associated with well-being post-intervention, including mindfulness, reappraisal, and self-compassion. CONCLUSION: This study provides a theoretical framework and preliminary support for a PER intervention for BD.

Emotion regulation strategy use and eating disorder symptoms in daily life.

OBJECTIVE: Emotion regulation is posited to be disrupted in eating disorders, but studies have yet to examine the linkage between eating disorder symptoms and emotion regulation strategy use in daily life. We conducted an experience sampling study investigating associations between trait-level difficulties with emotion regulation, daily emotion regulation strategy use, and eating disorder symptoms in daily life. METHOD: Fifty-three undergraduate women completed a trait-level measure of difficulties with emotion regulation, then reported their use of emotion regulation strategies four times per day for seven days. At the end of each day, they also reported daily disordered eating symptoms and behaviors. RESULTS: Reduced access to emotion regulation strategies at the trait-level was associated with dimensional eating disorder symptoms and food restriction across the study period. In addition, greater use of maladaptive strategies and attentional deployment and less use of adaptive strategies on a given day were associated with a higher likelihood of food restriction on that day. Moderation analyses based on baseline eating disorder symptoms indicated that associations were consistent across symptom severity. CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that certain eating disorder symptoms are associated with difficulties in regulating emotions at the trait-level and in daily life.

Toward an Understanding of Incongruent Affect in People With Schizophrenia.

Previous studies have found that people with schizophrenia report more negative affect (NA) in response to positive and neutral stimuli (incongruent NA) than people without schizophrenia, perhaps related to heightened overall NA. We sought to decrease NA and increase positive affect (PA) using the Broad-Minded Affective Coping (BMAC) procedure in people with (n = 29) and without (n = 26) schizophrenia. We also investigated whether decreased NA would contribute to a decrease in incongruent NA in people with schizophrenia. The BMAC procedure increased PA but did not decrease NA in participants, nor did it influence reports of incongruent NA (in response to positive and neutral films) in people with schizophrenia. Baseline NA in people with schizophrenia was correlated with incongruent NA and symptom severity. Results indicate that people with schizophrenia report heightened NA that does not readily diminish in the face of heightened PA.

A multicomponent approach toward understanding emotion regulation in schizophrenia.

OBJECTIVES: Emotion deficits are well documented in people with schizophrenia. Far less is known about their ability to implement emotion regulation strategies. We sought to explore whether people with schizophrenia can modify their emotion responses similar to controls. METHODS: People with (n = 25) and without (n = 21) schizophrenia were instructed to amplify positive-emotion expression, reappraise negative emotion experience, and suppress physiological response. Multiple components of emotion response were measured (experience, expression, and physiology). RESULTS: Although people with schizophrenia showed increased positive expressivity following amplification and decreased negative emotion experience following reappraisal, overall, they expressed less positive emotion and experienced more negative emotion compared with controls. Neither group was effective at physiological suppression. CONCLUSIONS: Together these findings suggest that people with schizophrenia can engage in amplification and reappraisal when explicitly instructed to do so, albeit additional practice may be necessary to modify emotion responses to levels similar to controls.

Defeatist performance beliefs in college students: Transdiagnostic associations with symptoms and daily goal-directed behavior.

Defeatist performance beliefs are prevalent and linked to decreased motivation in people with psychological disorders. In this study, we investigated whether defeatist performance beliefs were associated with transdiagnostic psychopathology risk in people with no history of formal diagnosis and whether defeatist performance beliefs impacted engagement in daily goal-directed behavior. One hundred and two college students completed self-report measures of defeatist performance beliefs and risk for depression, mania, and psychosis. Sixty-one of these participants were randomly selected to identify a goal and complete daily surveys about their actual and expected goal progress, effort expenditure, experienced pleasure, and difficulty of goal pursuit. We found that greater defeatist performance beliefs were associated with higher risk for depression, mania, and psychosis. Using multilevel modeling, we found that greater defeatist performance beliefs predicted less goal progress, effort expenditure, and pleasure from goal pursuit. Together, these findings suggest that defeatist performance beliefs may impact goal-directed behavior in healthy people with no reported psychiatric history. Interventions targeting defeatist performance beliefs may have utility for actual goal-directed behavior in many people, regardless of psychiatric status.

Prospection deficits in schizophrenia: Evidence from clinical and subclinical samples.

Previous research has revealed anticipatory pleasure deficits in people with schizophrenia and people with social anhedonia but who do not have schizophrenia. Prospection is an important component of anticipatory pleasure, but little is known about the role of prospection in social anhedonia. In 2 studies, we investigated prospection and anticipatory pleasure in people with schizophrenia and people with social anhedonia using an affective prospection task and a self-report measure, the Temporal Experience of Pleasure Scale (TEPS). In Study 1, we found that people with schizophrenia (n = 31) reported less TEPS anticipatory pleasure, generated less rich and vivid prospections, and reported less preexperiencing of future events than people without schizophrenia (n = 29). In Study 2, we found that people with social anhedonia (n = 34) reported less TEPS anticipatory pleasure, generated less rich prospections, and reported less pleasure and preexperiencing for future events than people without social anhedonia (n = 33). Taken together, prospection impairments and decreased anticipatory pleasure were observed in schizophrenia and social anhedonia. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).

Anticipatory Emotion in Schizophrenia.

While people with schizophrenia report experiencing as much emotion in the presence of emotionally evocative stimuli as do people without schizophrenia, evidence suggests that they have deficits in the anticipation of positive emotion. However, little is known about the anticipation of negative emotion in schizophrenia, thus leaving open whether anticipation deficits are more general. We sought to assess anticipation of positive and negative stimuli across multiple methods of measurement. We measured reported experience and emotion modulated startle response in people with (n = 27) and without (n = 27) schizophrenia as they anticipated and subsequently viewed evocative pictures. People with schizophrenia showed an overall dampened response during the anticipation of positive and negative stimuli, suggesting a more general deficit in anticipatory emotional responses. Moreover, anticipatory responses were related to symptoms and functioning in people with schizophrenia. Together, these findings point to important new directions for understanding emotion deficits in schizophrenia.

Cross Cultural Validation and Extension of the Clinical Assessment Interview for Negative Symptoms (CAINS) in the Chinese Context: Evidence from a Spectrum Perspective.

The Clinical Assessment Interview for Negative Symptoms (CAINS) was designed in accordance with the recent theory and research in social affective neuroscience and to address the psychometric and conceptual limitations of other instruments assessing negative symptoms. The present study aimed to provide a large-scale validation of the CAINS in China and examine its applicability and validity evidence across the schizophrenia spectrum. Using confirmatory factor analysis, our results replicated the original findings in the US development samples that the CAINS possesses a stable 2-factor structure, namely "motivation/pleasure" and "expression". We also found significant correlations between the CAINS and other negative symptom measures. The CAINS demonstrated good discriminant validity in differentiating negative symptoms in people with schizophrenia, nonpsychotic first-degree relatives and people with social anhedonia. People with schizophrenia exhibited significantly higher CAINS subscale scores than first-degree relatives and healthy controls. In addition, first-degree relatives had higher "motivation/pleasure" scores than healthy controls. The "motivation/pleasure" subscale scores of individuals with social anhedonia were also significantly higher than healthy controls.

The structural invariance of the Temporal Experience of Pleasure Scale across time and culture.

The Temporal Experience of Pleasure Scale (TEPS) is a self-report instrument that assesses pleasure experience. Initial scale development and validation in the United States yielded a two-factor solution comprising anticipatory and consummatory pleasure. However, a four-factor model that further parsed anticipatory and consummatory pleasure experience into abstract and contextual components was a better model fit in China. In this study, we tested both models using confirmatory factor analysis in an American and a Chinese sample and examined the configural measurement invariance of both models across culture. We also examined the temporal stability of the four-factor model in the Chinese sample. The results indicated that the four-factor model of the TEPS was a better fit than the two-factor model in the Chinese sample. In contrast, both models fit the American sample, which also included many Asian American participants. The four-factor model fit both the Asian American and Chinese samples equally well. Finally, the four-factor model demonstrated good measurement and structural invariance across culture and time, suggesting that this model may be applicable in both cross-cultural and longitudinal studies.

Attenuated positive psychotic symptoms and the experience of anhedonia.

BACKGROUND: Deficits in anticipatory pleasure have been consistently shown among chronic, first-episode, and clinical high risk for psychosis populations, but much less attention has been given to non-clinical individuals experiencing attenuated positive psychotic symptoms (APPS). METHODS: Young adults (N = 1839) were administered the Temporal Experience of Pleasure Scale, which measures anticipatory and consummatory pleasure, and the Prodromal Questionnaire, which measures APPS. Analyses examined (1) total APPS endorsed and (2) comparisons of groups experiencing APPS that were endorsed as distressing (distressing APPS = D-APPS; experiencing more D-APPS = high-D-APPS, a potentially more clinically meaningful group; experiencing fewer D-APPS = low-D-APPS). RESULTS: Results indicated that anticipatory, but not consummatory, pleasure deficits were associated with elevated APPS. Additionally, the high-D-APPS group exhibited significantly less anticipatory pleasure compared with the low-D-APPS group, but did not differ in consummatory pleasure. CONCLUSION: Our results mirror findings in schizophrenia samples and suggest that anticipatory pleasure deficits occur along the entire continuum of psychotic experiences.

Anticipated pleasure for positive and negative social interaction outcomes in schizophrenia.

While recent research suggests that people with schizophrenia anticipate less pleasure for non-social events, considerably less is known about anticipated pleasure for social events. In this study, we investigated whether people with and without schizophrenia differ in the amount and updating of anticipated pleasure over the course of repeated interactions as well as the influence of emotional displays. Thirty-two people with schizophrenia and 29 controls rated their anticipated pleasure over the course of repeated interactions with smiling, scowling, or neutral social partners that had either positive or negative outcomes. Compared to controls, people with schizophrenia anticipated a lower amount of pleasure during interactions with smiling, but not neutral social partners that had positive outcomes. However, the groups did not differ in the amount or updating of anticipated pleasure during interactions that had negative outcomes. Both groups anticipated more pleasure over the course of repeated interactions with smiling partners and less pleasure over the course of repeated interactions with scowling partners compared to interactions with neutral partners. We discuss how less anticipated pleasure for interactions with smiling social partners may be linked to difficulties in social engagement among people with schizophrenia.

Paradigms for Assessing Hedonic Processing and Motivation in Humans: Relevance to Understanding Negative Symptoms in Psychopathology.

Clinicians and researchers have long known that one of the debilitating aspects of psychotic disorders is the presence of "negative symptoms," which involve impairments in hedonic and motivational function, and/or alterations in expressive affect. We have a number of excellent clinical tools available for assessing the presence and severity of negative symptoms. However, to better understand the mechanisms that may give rise to negative symptoms, we need tools and methods that can help distinguish among different potential contributing causes, as a means to develop more targeted intervention pathways. Using such paradigms is particularly important if we wish to understand whether the causes are the same or different across disorders that may share surface features of negative symptoms. This approach is in line with the goals of the Research Diagnostic Criteria Initiative, which advocates understanding the nature of core dimensions of brain-behavior relationships transdiagnostically. Here we highlight some of the emerging measures and paradigms that may help us to parse the nature and causes of negative symptoms, illustrating both the research approaches from which they emerge and the types of constructs that they can help elucidate.

Explicit and implicit reinforcement learning across the psychosis spectrum.

Motivational and hedonic impairments are core features of a variety of types of psychopathology. An important aspect of motivational function is reinforcement learning (RL), including implicit (i.e., outside of conscious awareness) and explicit (i.e., including explicit representations about potential reward associations) learning, as well as both positive reinforcement (learning about actions that lead to reward) and punishment (learning to avoid actions that lead to loss). Here we present data from paradigms designed to assess both positive and negative components of both implicit and explicit RL, examine performance on each of these tasks among individuals with schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, and bipolar disorder with psychosis, and examine their relative relationships to specific symptom domains transdiagnostically. None of the diagnostic groups differed significantly from controls on the implicit RL tasks in either bias toward a rewarded response or bias away from a punished response. However, on the explicit RL task, both the individuals with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder performed significantly worse than controls, but the individuals with bipolar did not. Worse performance on the explicit RL task, but not the implicit RL task, was related to worse motivation and pleasure symptoms across all diagnostic categories. Performance on explicit RL, but not implicit RL, was related to working memory, which accounted for some of the diagnostic group differences. However, working memory did not account for the relationship of explicit RL to motivation and pleasure symptoms. These findings suggest transdiagnostic relationships across the spectrum of psychotic disorders between motivation and pleasure impairments and explicit RL. (PsycINFO Database Record

Facial emotion perception in schizophrenia: Does sex matter?

AIM: To review the literature on sex differences in facial emotion perception (FEP) across the schizophrenia spectrum. METHODS: We conducted a systematic review of empirical articles that were included in five separate meta-analyses of FEP across the schizophrenia spectrum, including meta-analyses that predominantly examined adults with chronic schizophrenia, people with early (onset prior to age 18) or recent-onset (experiencing their first or second psychotic episode or illness duration less than 2 years) schizophrenia, and unaffected first-degree relatives of people with schizophrenia. We also examined articles written in English (from November 2011 through June 2015) that were not included in the aforementioned meta-analyses through a literature search in the PubMed database. All relevant articles were accessed in full text. We examined all studies to determine the sample sizes, diagnostic characteristics, demographic information, methodologies, results, and whether each individual study reported on sex differences. The results from the meta-analyses themselves as well as the individual studies are reported in tables and text. RESULTS: We retrieved 134 articles included in five separate meta-analyses and the PubMed database that examined FEP across the schizophrenia spectrum. Of these articles, 38 examined sex differences in FEP. Thirty of these studies did not find sex differences in FEP in either chronically ill adults with schizophrenia, early-onset or recently diagnosed people with schizophrenia, or first-degree relatives of people with schizophrenia. Of the eight studies that found sex differences in FEP, three found that chronically ill women outperformed men, one study found that girls with early-onset schizophrenia outperformed boys, and two studies found that women (including first-degree relatives, adults with schizophrenia, and the healthy control group) outperformed men on FEP tasks. In total, six of the eight studies that examined sex differences in FEP found that women outperformed men across the schizophrenia spectrum. CONCLUSION: Evidence to date suggests few sex differences in FEP in schizophrenia; both men and women across the schizophrenia spectrum have deficits in FEP.