Proposal summaries
B4712 - Exploring Overgeneral Autobiographical Memory as a Mechanism Underpinning the High Risk of Depression for those with ADHD - 07/10/2024
People with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder are at significantly higher risk of developing depression compared to those without. The combination of ADHD and depression together is particularly concerning due to the higher risk of suicide. Understanding the reasons why people with ADHD are more likely to have depression is therefore important and could lead to treatments that are more effective for people with ADHD.
Recalling memories of the personal past in a more general rather than specific way (referred to as overgeneral autobiographical memory – OGM) is common in people with depression and may be a process that makes people with ADHD more likely to develop depression. There has been little research on OGM for people with ADHD so far. This project will explore whether OGM is a feature that makes people with ADHD more like to have depression.
B4713 - Psychological Distress Socioeconomic Position and Inflammatory Biomarkers Across the Life Course - 07/10/2024
Mental health issues are among the primary contributors to the global disease burden. Chronic systemic inflammation is a major suspected mechanism, as poor mental health has been linked to the elevated production of inflammatory molecules, which may in turn adversely affect health. While mental health is often considered a risk factor of its own, it may also reflect underlying adverse socioeconomic conditions. Studies have highlighted a social gradient in inflammatory biomarkers, showing that individuals with lower income, education, and occupational status are more likely to have elevated systemic inflammation biomarkers.
The precise factors explaining this social gradient in inflammation remain unclear. Poor social circumstances can lead to poor mental health, which might in turn affect biological pathways. Additionally, it is plausible that individuals facing challenging social circumstances may have fewer resources available to manage mental health issues, which can, in turn, affect their physiology. Understanding the interplay between mental health, social circumstances, and inflammation is further complicated by developmental influences, where early life stress and social environment may have a significant impact on health in later life.
To address these gaps, this project will leverage cutting-edge statistical methods, allowing us to draw new insights into how mental health and social circumstances jointly contribute to systemic inflammation across the life course. We will analyse data from three British cohort studies, each covering different age ranges and capturing multiple instances of mental health evaluations, socioeconomic indicators, biomarkers of inflammation, and other influences.
B4711 - The early-life exposome and its relations to psychopathology neurodevelopment and DNA methylation - 07/10/2024
A wide range of different environmental factors from before birth to early childhood (for example maternal stress and depression, family income, childhood maltreatment, or the home food environment) contributes to increased risk for developing mental and physical health problems later in life. Usually, these factors are studied in isolation, without considering how they might interact and affect each other. In our project at the McGill Douglas Mental Health University Institute, we want to analyse all of these factors in one statistical model and see whether they cluster into different subdomains. We will then investigate if those subdomains are predictive of behavioural and cognitive problems, body mass index, and epigenetic aging.
B4710 - Prenatal mental health impacts on parenting child feeding practices and child anthropometry - 04/10/2024
Experiencing mental health issues during pregnancy and after birth can have implications for how womens parenting, including how they feed their children which can impact on child weight outcomes. This research will examine the impact of prenatal mental health (such as anxiety, depression and stress) on women's feelings towards pregnancy and intentions and attitudes to feeding, how they feed their child (in terms of breastfeeding and diet), and child body mass index. These findings can help inform how best to support women and their children.
B4706 - The role of DNA methylation in predicting the impact of adverse childhood experiences on chronic pain - 01/10/2024
Exposure to one or more adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), which include abuse, neglect, and household/external challenges, are known to have a negative impact on health outcomes in later life. One such outcome is chronic pain. The Consortium Against Pain inEquality (CAPE) was established to investigate relationships between ACEs and chronic pain, among other things looking for potential mediators and modifiers.
One avenue that CAPE is exploring is the potential for ACE exposure to affect epigenetic mechanisms, such as DNA methylation. This is a process that affects cellular and molecular pathways, and in doing so, may cause vulnerabilities to such outcomes as chronic pain.
Using ALSPAC alongside other population cohorts, we will conduct analyses to investigate the influence of ACE exposure on chronic pain vulnerability, with a focus on the factors that may contribute to such a relationship.
B4708 - Associations of Childhood Vitamin D Status with Vascular Function and Cardiometabolic Health in Early Adulthood - 02/10/2024
Although cardiovascular disease (CVD) has traditionally been thought of as a condition that affects older individuals, it is now understood that its origins may begin to develop early in life, during childhood. It is therefore important to identify and promote healthy lifestyle factors in early life stages that may prevent CVD.
Vitamin D has emerged as an important factor in maintaining a healthy cardiovascular system. Low blood levels of vitamin D can lead to inflammation, altered hormone levels, and reduced release of molecules that relax blood vessels. This can in turn raise blood pressure and increase the risk of heart attacks, strokes, and other cardiovascular problems.
Although it is understood that there is an association between vitamin D status and heart health, few studies have explored whether vitamin D concentrations in childhood are related to CVD risk factors and vascular health later in life. To address this gap in the literature, we will use data from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC), which has monitored the health of children from birth into adulthood. Our goal is to determine if higher vitamin D concentrations in the blood during childhood are associated with better vessel function and cardiovascular health indicators – including blood sugar, blood fats, blood pressure, and body fat mass – in adulthood. The goal of this study is to help clarify whether adequate vitamin D concentrations during childhood reduces the risk of developing CVD later in life.
B4709 - Safe adolescent relationships Towards tailored prevention - 01/10/2024
Intimate partner violence (IPV) among adolescents and young adults is a growing yet under-explored problem. IPV can include emotional, physical, and sexual abuse between romantic partners, and it can lead to long-lasting harm. Some adolescents and young adults face higher risk of being involved in IPV, either as victims or perpetrators, especially if they have certain personality traits or have experienced difficult circumstances, such as childhood maltreatment. However, there is still a lack of targeted interventions in the UK that aim to prevent IPV in this group accounting for individual and contextual risk profiles. This project will investigate how personality and experiences of childhood maltreatment influence the risk of IPV among adolescents and young adults, and lay the groundwork for the development of a tailored intervention to promote safe relationships in this group.
B4705 - What is the relationship between vitamin D and inflammatory markers with brain-body connections in autism and Attention Deficit - 27/09/2024
People with autism and ADHD have a high occurrence of 1) vitamin D deficiency and 2) having a physical inflammatory condition such as rheumatoid arthritis or inflammatory bowel disease. Understanding if there are genetic links between these occurrences may raise awareness in screening for early signs of inflammation in people with autism and ADHD.
In recent years, a number of studies have proposed that vitamin D has connections in inflammatory processes within the body. There are a number of genes that connect vitamin D metabolism with autism and ADHD, vitamin D metabolism with a systemic inflammatory condition and ADHD with a systemic inflammatory condition.
Initial observations from a process called mendelian randomisation suggest that causal link is potentially present. I am therefore asking if individuals that differ in these genes may be at increased risk of developing a physical inflammatory condition such as inflammatory bowel disease or rheumatoid arthritis. I am also interested in finding out whether differences in these genes increase the risk of progression to an intervention being required, such as medicines or hospitalisation for physical health inflammation symptoms.
My project will involve looking at genetic material from people diagnosed with autism and/or ADHD, their vitamin D levels and comparing the frequencies of inflammation conditions of these genes with the frequencies found in the general population. I will also look at whether certain forms of the gene are more prevalent in hospitalised patients, compared to those who are not. The value in this research is that it could help us understand more about the role the role of vitamin D and inflammation signalling pathways in people with autism and/ or ADHD, and identify targets for drug treatment. Importantly, it may help us to identify individuals who should have routine screening for an inflammatory condition to prevent it causing disabilities. As this project will only involve reanalysis of existing data, I expect the project duration to be a period of months.
B4704 - The effects of exercise on mental health - 02/10/2024
There will be two student projects using the same scrambled dataset. Both projects will be looking at the links between exercise and mental health, but they will ask slightly different research questions:
1. Does physical activity moderate the relationship between genetic liability to depression and severity of depressive symptoms?
2. Does body dissatisfaction mediate the relationship between physical activity and severity of depressive symptoms?
B4701 - Data-driven analysis of parenting styles in early language development - 24/09/2024
Parents differ in numerous ways, including how they engage verbally and non-verbally with their infants. As the most important source of learning, parents play a key role in teaching critical skills such as language and communication. However, despite the vital role parents play, most research on how children acquire language has focused on identifying general learning mechanisms, often ignoring individual differences among parents. This approach assumes a "one-size-fits-all" model, leading to general recommendations for all parents. In reality, parenting styles vary widely, and more individualised guidance may be more effective.
Our project aims to fill this gap by investigating how individual parenting styles affect language development. Rather than focusing on isolated mechanisms, we propose a data-driven approach to explore how parents function as "language coaches" for their infants. By moving away from idealised, uniform learning models, we seek to uncover how different styles contribute to language acquisition.
Traditionally, research has looked at individual behaviors—such as pitch, speech rate, or vocabulary—separately as predictors of language outcomes. This overlooks how parents combine strategies during interactions. Some parents may rely on prosodic features like varied pitch and slower speech, while others use repetition to reinforce associations between objects and words. Meanwhile, others may provide more varied input, responding rapidly to their child's shifting focus during play. These varied, yet effective approaches highlight the need to understand how different parenting strategies foster language development.
Our project challenges the assumption that all parents should follow the same guidelines to support language development. We will investigate how different combinations of parental behaviours, or "coaching styles," contribute to language learning.
The aim of this project is to investigate the impact of different parental coaching styles on early language development. Specifically, we seek to:
Identify consistent patterns in how parents modify their speech and interaction when engaging with their children.
Examine the connection between these coaching styles and the synchrony observed in parent-infant interactions.
To achieve these goals, we will use cluster analysis, a data-driven method that identifies natural groupings in parental speech and communication behaviours. This allows us to explore how different aspects of speech—such as pitch, speed, and vocabulary—combine with interaction styles, like following or directing a child’s attention.
We will analyse a unique dataset of video recordings from head-mounted cameras worn by both parents and infants during free-play sessions, collected as part of the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC). These recordings offer an in-depth, dual-perspective view of parent-infant interactions, capturing the dynamics of communication and engagement in naturalistic settings. By studying this data, we aim to identify clusters of distinct parenting styles and link them to children's language development outcomes. Furthermore, we will explore how parental characteristics, such as anxiety or depression, may influence these parenting styles and their potential impact on language acquisition.
This project will enhance our understanding of diverse parenting strategies, enabling more personalised support, particularly for families with children experiencing language delays. When recommendations feel natural for parents, they are easier to follow, increasing the potential for positive impacts on children's development. Our findings could help shape more effective support programmes for parents, educators, and policymakers by providing practical, tailored advice that reflects individual differences in language coaching styles.
B4702 - Developmental origins of mental health risks in families an intergenerational and interdisciplinary life-course perspective - 04/10/2024
It has been suggested that parenting (i.e., parenting behaviours directed toward children) is passed through the generations. However, rigorous evaluation of intergenerational (IG) continuity (i.e., similarities/differences in mean levels of parenting behaviours across generations) and stability (i.e., associations between parents and children’s parenting behaviours) of parenting is lacking. Substantial gaps in existing evidence remain regarding which parenting behaviours are transmitted, when in development transmission occurs and what process underly continuity and discontinuity of IG transmission. Furthermore, longitudinal research that examines associations between parenting in one generation (e.g., G0; grandparents), parenting of the next generation (G1; parents) and developmental and mental health in their offspring (G2; grandchildren) is very limited. Insights into these questions are crucial for targeted intervention and prevention programmes to address IG continuity and stability of parenting to improve offspring developmental and mental health outcomes in the next generation.
Existing evidence-base regarding IG transmission of parenting and its role in intergenerational transmission of mental health risks is extremely limited. Most studies are retrospective, while prospective three-generational studies that utilise data from three generations (G0/Grandparents->G1/Parents->G2/Grandchildren) are acutely lacking. Relatedly, most evidence is based on retrospective rather than prospective reports of parenting, which may be prone to recall and reporting bias, particularly in the context of parental depression. IG transmission has been mostly examined in the context of maltreatment and harsh parenting (e.g., aggressive, abusive, highly conflictual), with few studies addressing IG transmission of positive parenting in non-clinical populations (e.g., parental monitoring, warmth and enjoyment, inductive discipline, ‘normative’ levels of conflict). Furthermore, evidence of sex differences in IG transmission of parenting is almost non-existing, with most studies historically focusing on mothers and not fathers, without differentiating between genetic, psychological and contextual factors that may confound IG transmission of parenting. Importantly, it remains unclear through which processes and/or mechanisms parenting is transmitted across generations and the role it plays in offspring mental health and development due to retrospective designs and lack of prospective longitudinal three-generational study on parenting and mental health that enable to infer causality. Understanding processes that underly continuity and stability of IG transmission of parenting (i.e., mediators) and factors that disrupt continuity and stability of IG transmission of parenting (i.e., moderators) is of crucial importance to preventive (e.g., enhancing positive parenting) and targeted intervention programs (e.g., disrupting negative parenting) to break the IG cycle of negative parenting and adverse offspring outcomes.
Although self-reported data on parenting captures parental perceptions and attitudes to parenting, it may be biased by parental mental health status and does not capture the nature and quality of family and parent-child interactions. Specifically, family interactions provide a fundamental context for offspring development. In two-parent families (irrespective of parental sex and gender), children experience dyadic and triadic interactions routinely. Family-systems perspective emphasises importance of family sub-systems, such as mother-child, father-child, parent-parent relationship and co-parenting, as developmentally formative in influencing offspring development. These interactional subsystems are interrelated exerting mutual effects, however, they are not captured by dyadic mother- and father-child interactions. Dyadic interactions provide important insights into individual patterns of parent-child interactions (within sub-systems), which are related yet distinct from interaction patterns within other family sub-systems, including parental relationship and co-parenting sub-systems. Emphasis on dyadic parent-child interactions only obscures important role that family-level interactions play in offspring development because accumulation of individual measures is not equivalent to the whole family measure and parental and child behaviours may not be organised in the same way across dyadic and triadic contexts. Furthermore, children have the capacity to engage in both dyadic and triadic interactions early in infancy, with both parental and child behaviours mutually affecting each other, suggesting the need to consider child interactive behaviours in the context of dyadic and triadic interactions. Despite developmental importance of triadic interactions, there is a distinct lack of studies examining both dyadic and triadic interactions and their impact on offspring developmental and mental health outcomes, particularly in the context of parental depression. This is a substantial limitation given growing evidence supporting the importance of triadic family interactions for offspring developmental and mental health outcomes, as well as important clinical implications. Qualitative meaning of the family interactions to parents is as important as behavioural manifestations, particularly in those families where parents experience mental health difficulties. However, it is rarely captured in research, constituting an important limitation as these meanings have important implications for the development of targeted interventions to improve parental and offspring mental health.
B4698 - Architecture of environmental associations on the proteomics - 23/09/2024
We aim to characterize the associations between environmental exposures and genetics on circulating proteome.
B4697 - Understanding childhood adversity and co-occurring overweight and internalizing symptoms using life course and genetically-infor - 23/09/2024
Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are associated with multiple negative health behaviors and consequences including both physical and mental health conditions in adulthood. Previous studies have commonly examined the impact of ACEs on a single outcome. However, recent evidence shows that exposure to ACEs may also increase the risk of multimorbidity such as overweight or obesity in combination with mental health conditions. This project will explore this, and the mechanisms through which the co-occurrence of overweight/obesity and mental health problems might arise.
B4696 - Early conditions delayed adult effects and morbidity disability and mortality in modern human populations - 27/09/2024
This study explores the influence of the ”home obesogenic environment” on childhood obesity and, in particular, the interplay between the environmental and genetic factors. To do so, we generate a latent variable for “home environment” using domains that have been established in the literature as contributing to obesity, generating what we call the “Cultural Risk Score (CRS)”. Using two U.S. datasets, the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) and the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study and one British data set (ALSPAC), we employ Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) to assess how environmental and genetic factors affect children’s BMI and how different levels of CRS can modulate genetic penetrance. Preliminary findings for the U.S. datasets indicate that dietary factors, physical activity and parental education are the most relevant domains for the home obesogenic environment. Additionally, the model reveals significant variations in genetic effects on BMI across different CRS levels, suggesting important gene-environment interactions. The CRS will be an input in a generalized stable population model and Agent Based Model whose goal is to predict future obesity trajectories.
B4700 - Causal Pathways in Child Maltreatment Insights from Longitudinal Data on Parenting and Child Development - 24/09/2024
The causes and consequences of child maltreatment remain highly controversial. Social-psychological and health factors such as parenting stress and child behaviour disorders are often identified as major risk factors for child maltreatment; however, there is limited evidence from existing studies to establish a temporal sequence that confirms a causal relationship. Taking parenting stress as an example, according to the Stress and Coping Model of Child Maltreatment Theory (Hillson & Kuiper, 1994), most research has focused on a unidirectional relationship in which parenting stress leads to child maltreatment. However, emerging evidence suggests a potential vicious cycle in which child maltreatment increases parenting stress through parental guilt and children’s behavioural issues. Verification of these dynamics relies on longitudinal data for bidirectional temporal analysis. This project aims to employ techniques such as cross-lagged panel model to investigate the bidirectional temporal effects between social-psychological or health factors and child maltreatment. By addressing these gaps, this study seeks to enhance understanding of the interplay between parental and child-specific features and child maltreatment, contributing valuable insights to inform prevention and intervention strategies.
B4695 - Effects of age at onset of puberty on Locus of Control of Reinforcement in a longitudinal cohort study ALSPAC - 18/09/2024
Locus of Control of reinforcement (LOC) has been shown to have far reaching effects in academic and professional achievement, as well as mental and physical health and well-being. In brief, those considered internally controlled (i.e. belief that an outcome is mainly contingent upon their own choices and behaviour) have better outcomes in all areas than those who are more externally controlled (believing what they do makes little difference, and everything is down to luck, chance or powerful others).
Previous research has identified that there is stability in adult LOC over time, however, adolescent LOC is more volatile because of faster and extensive emotional and physical changes.
LOC is important as it has been shown to have an effect almost every aspect of life (on educational achievement, business/employment, financial security, physical and mental health and even mortality (internality predicting better outcomes)). There appears to be no research conducted to date that specifically looks at whether early or late onset of puberty changes an adolescent’s orientation from that at pre- to post-puberty.
LOC was collected from ALSPAC offspring participants at the ages of 8 (n=), 16 (n=) and 27 years (n=). Puberty questionnaires were administered annually between the ages of 8 and 17 years. SITAR calculations of height to derive age at peak height velocity were also available. From the data available we will ascertain the age at which puberty starts and if this has an impact on LOC internality post-puberty.
Aims:
To ascertain whether pubertal timing affects LOC orientation at 16, and whether this remains stable or moves towards internality by age 27.
Are there lasting effects of LOC/pubertal timing on outcomes at age 27+ (including risky behaviours, educational achievement, financial security, criminality, depression and anxiety)?
Why is LOC important in adolescence?
Those children who are external are less likely to do well academically with potentially lasting effects throughout the lifespan. As puberty occurs prior to major educational assessments (GCSEs especially and A levels), it is important to assess if LOC is affected by it. If so, targeted interventions may increase students’ internality at this crucial period in their lives.
B4691 - Impact of blood cell traits at birth and throughout childhood - 17/09/2024
Blood traits, such as complete blood count and fetal hemoglobin, are implicated in various physiological and pathological processes. The value of these traits is variable from one individual to another and a significant part of this variation that is due to genetic factors that have been identified. It has been shown in adults that these genetic factors impact patients’ management. However, their impact is poorly known in children. Per example, whether lower white blood count have an impact on infection risk and work up and whether a mildly lower hemoglobin level impairs growth is unclear. Moreover, whether the impact has a causal relationship is unknown. Finally, fetal hemoglobin is a type of hemoglobin specific to fetus that has been selected throughout evolution to favor oxygen delivery to the newborn as it ties more strongly to oxygen than the adult hemoglobin from the mother. As some fetal hemoglobin may persist in adults, the difference between mother and child fetal hemoglobin varies across pregnancies. However, the impact on weight at birth and later in life of this difference remains to be studied. Here, we propose to leverage state-of-the-art genetic approaches to address these two aspects blood traits. We will used the genetic variations known to be associated to blood traits to study their effect throughout childhood without the need of direct measurement. Deciphering the impact of blood traits in children will improve our understanding of their effect and may provide powerful tools to tailor patients’ management toward a personalized, precision medicine.
B4693 - Association of polygenic risk scores for depression anxiety and neuroticism with lower urinary tract symptoms in women - 17/09/2024
Observational studies have found evidence that depression, anxiety and neuroticism are prospectively associated with lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) in women. Although prospective studies provide evidence of the direction of observed associations, they are limited by unmeasured and residual confounding. Observational studies that rely on self-report questionnaires to assess depression, anxiety and neuroticism exposures are also limited by measurement error. Polygenic risk scores (PRS) can be used estimate an individual’s underlying genetic liability to complex traits such as depression, anxiety and neuroticism. PRS should not be associated with genetic or environmental confounders at a population level, which can bias observational studies.
B4694 - Linking social stressors and adolescent psychopathology The role of systemic inflammation - 17/09/2024
Adolescence has been described as a period of storm and stress since the beginning of the 20th century. In fact, this transitional period between childhood and adulthood is characterized by an increased exposure to social stressors, fundamental changes in various biological systems (e.g. immune maturation) and elevated psychopathological burden. Although adolescence is considered a critical window for mental health, the developmental relationship between social stressors, biological dysregulations and psychopathology during this period are poorly understood. Better knowledge about the interaction of these processes is needed, in order to identify promising targets for interventions designed to support adolescents at risk of mental health problems.
The aim of this project is to investigate the co-development of social stressors exposure (e.g., victimization experiences) and biological stress embedding (e.g. systemic inflammation) from late childhood to late adolescence and early adulthood, and their associations with psychopathology (e.g. transdiagnostic symptoms in the realm of self-harm).
The findings will provide novel insights into the developmental precursors of adolescent psychopathology and help improve prevention and intervention programs.
B4692 - GENESIS-LIFE - 17/09/2024
Throughout childhood, self-control undergoes substantial development, influenced by both genetic and environmental factors. Although the relative ranking of individuals’ self-control levels stabilizes in early adolescence, the developmental trajectory of the genetic risk for low self-control (LSC) remains poorly understood. This gap in our knowledge raises some critical questions: Is the genetic risk for LSC the same across childhood or are there specific developmental windows during which the risk exerts its strongest influence? Importantly, how do environmental factors, such as parenting, socioeconomic status, or neighbourhood characteristics, modify this genetic risk? This project aims to provide the first comprehensive answers to these questions. Focusing on childhood is crucial as this life stage is strongly shaped by environmental factors, making it an ideal target for intervention strategies, and these analyses will help to identify the optimal timeframe for maximizing the effectiveness. To achieve this objective, longitudinal structural equation modelling (SEM) will examine the dynamic association between LSC polygenic score (PGS) and early phenotypic manifestations in cohorts from 3 countries (UK, NL, CZ) and identify critical developmental windows. The models will incorporate selected environmental factors to test for gene-environment interaction (GxE).