Aberrant Resting-State Functional Connectivity Associated With Callous-Unemotional Traits From Late Childhood Through...

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Developmental Psychology
• Psychiatry

Background:

• Callous-unemotional (CU) traits signify impaired socioemotional processing and are associated with severe conduct problems.
• Previous resting-state studies suggest altered large-scale network organization in CU traits, but comprehensive developmental analyses are lacking.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate associations between CU traits and resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) within and between the default mode network (DMN), salience network (SN), and frontoparietal network (FPN).
• To examine these associations across development in a large adolescent sample.

Main Methods:

• Utilized data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study (N = 11,868; 48% female) with four repeated time points.
• Examined rsFC within and between DMN, FPN, and SN in relation to CU traits in participants aged 9 to 18 years.
• Employed linear mixed-effects models, assessing age and sex as moderators, and controlling for co-occurring psychopathology.

Main Results:

• CU traits were associated with reduced within-DMN rsFC.
• No sex interaction was found, but a significant age interaction revealed a negative association between CU traits and DMN-SN rsFC in mid-to-late adolescence.
• Higher CU traits correlated with an age-related decline in DMN-SN rsFC.

Conclusions:

• Youth with elevated CU traits display atypical developmental trajectories of resting-state connectivity in networks vital for empathy and salience processing.
• Findings indicate persistent DMN hypoconnectivity and a later-emerging, accelerated age-related segregation of DMN-SN connectivity in adolescents with CU traits.
• This pattern suggests a delayed yet exaggerated differentiation of socioaffective networks, highlighting adolescence as a critical period for intervention.