title: Attenuated behavioral and brain responses to trust violations among assaulted adolescent girls.
abstract: Physical and sexual assault during adolescence is a potent risk factor for mental health and psychosocial problems, as well as revictimization, especially among female victims. To better understand this conferred risk, we conducted an exploratory study comparing assaulted and non-assaulted girls׳ behavioral and brain responses during a trust learning task. Adolescent girls (14 assaulted, 16 non-assaulted) performed a functional magnetic resonance imaging task that manipulated the percentages of which three different faces delivered positive and negative outcomes. Analyses focused on comparing unexpected to expected outcomes. We found that assaulted adolescent girls demonstrated less behavioral slowing in response to unexpected negative social outcomes, or trust violations (i.e., when a presumably trustworthy face delivered a negative outcome), relative to control girls. Trust violations were also associated with less activation in anterior insular and anterior cingulate regions among the assaulted group compared to the control group. Furthermore, we found that the severity of participants׳ exposure to assaultive events scaled negatively with recruitment of these regions. These preliminary results suggest that assault victims may engage differential learning processes upon unexpected negative social outcomes. These findings have implications for understanding impaired trust learning and social functioning among assault victims.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, New York University, New York, NY, USA.
authors.forename: Jennifer K
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Lenow
authors.affiliation: Brain Imaging Research Center, Psychiatric Research Institute, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Little Rock, AR, USA.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Scott Steele
authors.affiliation: Brain Imaging Research Center, Psychiatric Research Institute, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Little Rock, AR, USA.
authors.forename: Sonet
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Smitherman
authors.affiliation: Brain Imaging Research Center, Psychiatric Research Institute, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Little Rock, AR, USA.
authors.forename: Clinton D
authors.initials: CD
authors.lastname: Kilts
authors.affiliation: Brain Imaging Research Center, Psychiatric Research Institute, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Little Rock, AR, USA. Electronic address: jcisler@uams.edu.
authors.forename: Josh M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Cisler
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000294:Adolescent Behavior; D000328:Adult; D001921:Brain; D001931:Brain Mapping; D002540:Cerebral Cortex / Q000473:pathology*; D019548:Crime Victims / Q000523:psychology; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005145:Face; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007858:Learning; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D008297:Male; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012742:Sex Offenses / Q000523:psychology*; D012917:Social Adjustment; D013313:Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic / Q000523:psychology; D035502:Trust; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Adolescence; Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI); Learning; Trauma; Trust