Tuesday, September 16, 2025 9/16/2025

Progressive social withdrawal in trauma-exposed older adolescents and young adults: neurocircuitry predictors

Award Number: R01MH125852
ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF MENTAL HEALTH
OPDIV: NIH
AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY
AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: SCIENTIFIC/HEALTH RESEARCH (INCLUDES SURVEYS)
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 09/20/2021
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 07/31/2026

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Progressive social withdrawal in trauma-exposed older adolescents and young adults: neurocircuitry predictors - Social withdrawal is a transdiagnostic phenotype that is strongly associated with detrimental physical and mental health outcomes across the lifespan. As quantified using structural features of individuals’ social networks, social withdrawal is associated with 60-70% increased mortality and a threefold increase in suicide risk. Recent findings document associations between trauma-related psychopathology and altered social network structural features, including size, density, diversity, and embeddedness. Critically, because the transition to adulthood (age 16-20) is a period of rapid expansion in social networks, forms of psychopathology that produce social withdrawal may confer particular risk for poor outcomes during this developmental stage. Thus, the transition to adulthood is a key developmental period for the evolution of social withdrawal in trauma- exposed populations. Recent literature indicates that social reward processing may drive social network size and complexity, but the role of disrupted social reward functioning in driving progressive social withdrawal following trauma exposure is poorly understood. Using an innovative longitudinal design including digital phenotyping of social behavior, the proposed study will investigate activity and connectivity within brain regions that bidirectionally code for social approach and avoidance, including the basolateral amygdala (BLA), ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC), and nucleus accumbens (NAcc). The hypothesis is that BLA-VMPFC- NAcc functional connectivity will prospectively predict progressive social withdrawal during the transition to adulthood following interpersonal trauma exposure. We will enroll 120 trauma-exposed participants (ages 16- 20) who endorse posttraumatic and/or depressive symptoms, and 60 healthy controls. Trauma-exposed participants will be stratified for baseline self-reported social anhedonia. We obtain baseline social withdrawal measures, including active self-reports of social interaction and passive smartphone based phenotyping of activity via accelerometer, GPS, and call/text metadata. Participants will complete an fMRI scan to obtain measures of BLA-VMPFC-NAcc connectivity, followed by one year of digital phenotyping using active and passive data to measure social withdrawal. Based on our extensive preliminary data, we hypothesize that: 1) baseline social withdrawal will be associated with baseline BLA-VMPFC-NAcc connectivity; (2) baseline BLA- VMPFC-NAcc connectivity will prospectively predict progressive social withdrawal over the course of a 12- month follow-up; (3) predictive models of social withdrawal that include BLA-VMPFC-NAcc connectivity will outperform alternate models. The proposed integrated approach (fMRI, digital phenotyping) will identify specific circuitry associated with progressive social withdrawal during the transition to adulthood, and will develop predictive algorithms that forecast social withdrawal trajectories based on baseline connectivity within BLA- VMPFC-NAcc circuitry. Ultimately this work could lead to the development of targeted interventions (e.g. neurofeedback), and may shift the field toward reward-circuitry accounts of social withdrawal.


Issue Date FY	Funding FY	Legal Entity Name	Legal Entity Address	Legal Entity City	Legal Entity State	Legal Entity Zip Code	Legal Entity COUNTY	Legal Entity COUNTRY	Assistance Listing	Award Code	Budget Year	Action Date	Action Type	Action Amount

Issue Date FY: 2025 ( Subtotal = $449,385 )
2025	2025	THE MCLEAN HOSPITAL CORPORATION	115 MILL ST	BELMONT	MA	02478	MIDDLESEX	USA	Mental Health Research Grants	000	5	7/8/2025	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$449,385
														Subtotal = $449,385

Issue Date FY: 2024 ( Subtotal = $508,685 )
2024	2024	THE MCLEAN HOSPITAL CORPORATION	115 MILL ST	BELMONT	MA	02478	MIDDLESEX	USA	Mental Health Research Grants	000	4	7/26/2024	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$508,685
														Subtotal = $508,685

Issue Date FY: 2023 ( Subtotal = $467,462 )
2023	2023	MCLEAN HOSPITAL CORPORATION, THE	115 MILL ST	BELMONT	MA	02478	MIDDLESEX	USA	Mental Health Research Grants	001	3	7/27/2023	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$467,462
2023	2022	MCLEAN HOSPITAL CORPORATION, THE	115 MILL ST	BELMONT	MA	02478	MIDDLESEX	USA	Mental Health Research Grants	000	2	3/22/2023	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$0
														Subtotal = $467,462

Issue Date FY: 2022 ( Subtotal = $493,433 )
2022	2022	MCLEAN HOSPITAL CORPORATION, THE	115 MILL ST	BELMONT	MA	02478	MIDDLESEX	USA	Mental Health Research Grants	001	2	7/28/2022	NON-COMPETING CONTINUATION	$493,433
2022	2021	MCLEAN HOSPITAL CORPORATION, THE	115 MILL ST	BELMONT	MA	02478	MIDDLESEX	USA	Mental Health Research Grants	000	1	11/5/2021	NEW	$0
														Subtotal = $493,433

Issue Date FY: 2021 ( Subtotal = $505,422 )
2021	2021	MCLEAN HOSPITAL CORPORATION, THE	115 MILL ST	BELMONT	MA	02478	MIDDLESEX	USA	Mental Health Research Grants	000	1	9/20/2021	NEW	$505,422
														Subtotal = $505,422

Grand Total All Awards = $2,424,387

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Progressive social withdrawal in trauma-exposed older adolescents and young adults: neurocircuitry predictors

Award Number: R01MH125852

ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF MENTAL HEALTH

OPDIV: NIH

AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY

AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: SCIENTIFIC/HEALTH RESEARCH (INCLUDES SURVEYS)

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 09/20/2021

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 07/31/2026

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