Childhood Trauma and Escape Decision Dynamics

• Conditions: Fear; Child Abuse
• Interventions: Other: fMRI assessment of cognitive and reactive fear

• Registration Number: NCT04290234
• Lead Sponsor: University Hospital, Bonn

Brief Summary

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effects of childhood maltreatment on cognitive and reactive fear.

Detailed Description

Childhood maltreatment dramatically increases the risk for psychiatric disorders accompanied by profound difficulties in social interactions. However, it is still unclear how childhood maltreatment affects social interactions in adulthood. In this study, we examine how childhood maltreatment may modulate threat sensitivity assessed by the distance at which an individual flees from an approaching threat. While rapid escape decisions rely on "reactive fear" circuits, slower escape decisions are associated with "cognitive fear" circuits. Based on previous observations of altered early sensory processing, we expect that childhood maltreatment affects both cognitive and reactive fear circuits.

Study Timeline

• Study Start: 2019-11-17
• Status Verified: 2020-02
• Study First Submitted: 2020-02-26
• Study First Submitted QC: 2020-02-26
• Last Update Submitted: 2020-02-26
• Study First Posted: 2020-02-28
• Last Update Posted: 2020-02-28
• Primary Completion: 2020-06
• Study Completion: 2020-06

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: UNKNOWN
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 80

Inclusion Criteria

• Healthy subjects with varying levels of childhood maltreatment

Exclusion Criteria

• current psychiatric illness
• current psychiatric medication or psychotherapy
• MRI contraindication (e.g. metal in body, claustrophobia)
• pregnancy

Study & Design

• Study Type: OBSERVATIONAL
• Study Design: Not specified

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Non-medicated healthy adults with childhood maltreatment	fMRI assessment of cognitive and reactive fear	The 25-item retrospective Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ) will be administered to assess history of abuse and neglect. The CTQ measures five types of maltreatment: emotional, physical, and sexual abuse and emotional and physical neglect.

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Difficulty ratings in the flight initiation distance (FID) task	fMRI paradigm with an average duration of 45 minutes	Associations between the difficulty ratings in the FID task and childhood maltreatment will be analyzed using regression analyses with Childhood Trauma Questionnaire scores. Behavioral data will be correlated with fMRI data of the FID task.
Confidence ratings in the flight initiation distance (FID) task	fMRI paradigm with an average duration of 45 minutes	Associations between the confidence ratings in the FID task and childhood maltreatment will be analyzed using regression analyses with Childhood Trauma Questionnaire scores. Behavioral data will be correlated with fMRI data of the FID task.
Neural responses in the flight initiation distance (FID) task	fMRI paradigm with an average duration of 45 minutes	Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) will be performed to measure blood-oxygen-level dependent signal in a flight initiation distance (FID) task, involving fast-, medium- and slow-attacking virtual predators that elicit distinct activations in the reactive and cognitive fear circuits. Blood-oxygen-level-dependent signals to different predator velocities will be analyzed. Analyses will focus on regions-of-interest associated with the processing of cognitive fear (ventromedial prefrontal cortex, posterior cingulate cortex, hippocampus, and basolateral amygdala) and reactive fear (midbrain periaqueductal gray, central amygdala, hypothalamus, and the midcingulate cortex). To examine effects of childhood maltreatment, regression analyses with Childhood Trauma Questionnaire scores will be conducted on the second level.
Flight distance in the flight initiation distance (FID) task	fMRI paradigm with an average duration of 45 minutes	Associations between the flight distance in the FID task and childhood maltreatment will be analyzed using regression analyses with Childhood Trauma Questionnaire scores. Behavioral data will be correlated with fMRI data of the FID task.

Trial Locations

Locations (1)

Department of Psychiatry, University of Bonn; 🇩🇪 Bonn, Germany