Life stress in adolescence predicts early adult reward-related brain function and alcohol dependence
Open accessAbstract
Stressful life events increase vulnerability to problematic alcohol use, and they may do this by disrupting reward-related neural circuitry. This is particularly relevant for adolescents because alcohol use rises sharply after mid-adolescence and alcohol abuse peaks at age 20. Adolescents also report more stressors compared with children, and neural reward circuitry may be especially vulnerable to stressors during adolescence because of prefrontal cortex remodeling. Using a large sample of male participants in a longitudinal functional magnetic resonance imaging study (N = 157), we evaluated whether cumulative stressful life events between the ages of 15 and 18 were associated with reward-related brain function and problematic alcohol use at age 20 years. Higher cumulative stressful life events during adolescence were associated with decreased response in the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) during monetary reward anticipation and following the receipt of monetary rewards. Stress-related decreases in mPFC response during reward anticipation and following rewarding outcomes were associated with the severity of alcohol dependence. Furthermore, mPFC response mediated the association between stressful life events and later symptoms of alcohol dependence. These data are consistent with neurobiological models of addiction that propose that stressors during adolescence increase risk for problematic alcohol use by disrupting reward circuit function.
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Lower mPFC activity during reward anticipation likewise mediated the link with alcohol dependence.
“A similar mediating effect of reduced activity in the mPFC during reward anticipation was found with alcohol dependence (Casement et al., 2015).”
From The effects of early life stress on reward processing (2018) · cites this paper as Casement et al., 2015
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“A similar mediating effect of reduced activity in the mPFC during reward anticipation was found with alcohol dependence (Casement et al., 2015).”
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- Authors
- Casement, M. D., Shaw, D. S., Sitnick, S. L., Musselman, S. C., & Forbes, E. E.
- Affiliations
- University of Pittsburgh (US)
- Venue
- Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience
- Publisher
- Oxford University Press (OUP)
- Published
- 2014-06-20
- Volume
- 10
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 416-423
- ISSN
- 1749-5016 (ISSN-L)
- 1749-5024
- PMC
- PMC4350480
- OpenAlex
- W2137862389
- Cited by
- 82
- References
- 67
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 10 · 2024: 8 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 7 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 6 · 2019: 7 · 2018: 7 · 2017: 10 · 2016: 2 · 2015: 8
- FWCI
- 5.04
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- Vanderbilt University
- National Institutes of Health
- National Institute of Mental Health (R01MH050907, R01MH093605)
- National Institute on Drug Abuse (R01DA026222, DA026222)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Epidemiology › Substance Abuse Treatment and Outcomes
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies
- Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience › Neurotransmitter Receptor Influence on Behavior
- Keywords
- life events, adolescence, alcoholism, alcohol abuse, reward processing, medial prefrontal cortex, prefrontal cortex development, mediation
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Aging, Alcoholism, Brain, Child, Child, Preschool, Female, Humans, Infant, Longitudinal Studies, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Motivation, Nerve Net, Psychomotor Performance, Reward, Stress, Psychological, Prefrontal Cortex, Young Adult, Anticipation, Psychological, Tobacco Use
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