The Mediating Role of Brain Structural Imaging Markers in Connecting Adverse Childhood Experiences and Psychological Resilience

Yun-Hsuan Chang; Meng-Heng Yang; Zai-Fu Yao; Meng-Che Tsai; Shulan Hsieh

doi:10.3390/children10020365

The Mediating Role of Brain Structural Imaging Markers in Connecting Adverse Childhood Experiences and Psychological Resilience

Children (Basel). 2023 Feb 11;10(2):365. doi: 10.3390/children10020365.

Authors

Yun-Hsuan Chang^{1

2

3

4}, Meng-Heng Yang³, Zai-Fu Yao^{5

6

7

8}, Meng-Che Tsai^{9

10}, Shulan Hsieh^{3

11

12}

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Gerontology, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan.
² Institute of Behavioral Medicine, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan.
³ Department of Psychology, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan.
⁴ Institute of Genomics and Bioinformatics, College of Life Sciences, National Chung Hsing University, Taichung 40227, Taiwan.
⁵ College of Education, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu City, 30013, Taiwan.
⁶ Research Center for Education and Mind Sciences, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu City 30013, Taiwan.
⁷ Basic Psychology Group, Department of Educational Psychology and Counseling, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu City 30013, Taiwan.
⁸ Department of Kinesiology, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu City 30013, Taiwan.
⁹ Department of Pediatrics, National Cheng Kung University Hospital, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan.
¹⁰ Department of Medical Humanities and Social Medicine, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan.
¹¹ Institute of Allied Health Sciences, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan.
¹² Department of Public Health, College of Medicine, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 70101, Taiwan.

Abstract

The impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on brain structure has been noticed. Resilience has been considered a protective characteristic from being mentally ill; however, the link between ACEs, psychological resilience, and brain imaging remains untested. A total of 108 participants (mean age 22.92 ± 2.43 years) completed the ACEs questionnaire and the Resilience Scale for Adults (RSA), with five subscales: personal strength (RSA_ps), family cohesion (RSA_fc), social resources (RSA_sr), social competence (RSA_sc), and future structured style (RSA_fss), and Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) to acquire imaging data, and the fusion-independent component analysis was employed to determine multimodal imaging components. The results showed a significantly negative association between ACE subscales and RSA_total score (ps < 0.05). The parallel mediation model showed significant indirect mediation of mean gray matter volumes in the regions of the middle frontal gyrus, superior frontal gyrus, posterior cingulate, superior temporal gyrus, middle temporal gyrus, postcentral gyrus, middle temporal gyrus, and precuneus between childhood maltreatment and RSA_sr and RSA_sc. (ps < 0.05). This study highlighted the ACEs effect on gray matter volumes in the regions of the middle frontal gyrus, superior frontal gyrus, posterior cingulate, superior temporal gyrus, middle temporal gyrus, postcentral gyrus, middle temporal gyrus, and precuneus leading to decreased psychological resilience.

Keywords: adverse childhood experiences; multimodality neuroimaging; resilience; social resources.

Abstract

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