B3331 - A polygenic approach to understanding resilience to peer victimisation - 25/06/2019

B number: 
B3331
Principal applicant name: 
Oliver Davis | MRC Integrative Epidemiology Unit, University of Bristol.
Co-applicants: 
Dr Claire Haworth, Jessica Armitage
Title of project: 
A polygenic approach to understanding resilience to peer victimisation
Proposal summary: 

Understanding mental illness is key to ensuring individuals remain mentally healthy across the life course. This study aims to explore the genetic and environmental factors underlying the mental health of victims of bullying. Individuals subjected to bullying are at a greater risk of later mental health issues. Our study will consider whether an increased genetic risk to depression influences the impact of adolescent bullying on later mental health. We will use available data from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) on depression to construct polygenic scores. These scores will be used to predict the mental health of victims following adolescent bullying, allowing us to test whether polygenic scores can discriminate the resilient from the non-resilient. Investigating why some people may avoid mental health problems after experiences of bullying could hold important implications for the prevention and treatment of victimisation and depression.

Impact of research: 
The current study will be the first to use polygenic risk scores associated with depression to explore the mental health outcomes of victims of bullying. In doing so, the study advances current knowledge on the outcomes of victims and helps to further understanding of their genetic susceptibility to mental illness. Such findings could hold important implications for the treatment and prevention of depression in those with previous experiences of adversity, and could provide further insight into the biological basis of victimisation. This will help to understand why some individuals are more likely be get bullied than others, and may thus help to reduce the occurrence of bullying within schools. By investigating factors that may moderate the influence of polygenic risk scores, the study also hopes to validate the need for further research into factors that attenuate the effects of depression and allow vulnerable individuals to foster resilience. This will provide the necessary information to develop interventions that target at-risk individuals to prevent the occurrence of victimisation and thus, the development of mental illness.
Date proposal received: 
Tuesday, 25 June, 2019
Date proposal approved: 
Tuesday, 25 June, 2019
Keywords: 
Mental health - Psychology, Psychiatry, Cognition, Mental health, Statistical methods, Genetic epidemiology