title: Neurodevelopment and ages of onset in depressive disorders.
abstract: How and why do clinical depressive disorders emerge in adolescence? In this Personal View, we present a neurodevelopmental theory to address causes for adolescent onsets of clinical depressive disorders. We argue that theories should account for three perplexing aspects of depressive disorders in adolescence: the episodic nature of depression; differences between sexes in rates of depression across development; and age-differentiated onsets. We consider how theories such as psychosocial acceleration, heterochronic brain development, dual-process models, glucocorticoid vulnerability hypothesis linked to early life stress, and epigenetic and genetic susceptibility might explain some aspects of adolescent depressive disorders. We argue that some synthesis between existing theories might be needed to establish a sufficient neurodevelopmental theoretical framework to explain onsets of depressive disorders in adolescence.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Department of Psychology, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA. Electronic address: cindy.hagan@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Cindy C
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Hagan
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
authors.forename: Julia M E
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Graham
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
authors.forename: Paul O
authors.initials: PO
authors.lastname: Wilkinson
authors.affiliation: Anna Freud Centre and Research Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology, University College London, London, UK.
authors.forename: Nick
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Midgley
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Medical Research Council and Wellcome Trust Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Wellcome Trust Neurosciences in Psychiatry Network, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
authors.forename: John
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Suckling
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Medical Research Council and Wellcome Trust Behavioural and Clinical Neuroscience Institute, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
authors.forename: Barbara J
authors.initials: BJ
authors.lastname: Sahakian
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK; Wellcome Trust Neurosciences in Psychiatry Network, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.
authors.forename: Ian M
authors.initials: IM
authors.lastname: Goodyer
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D041923:Adolescent Development; D017668:Age of Onset; D003866:Depressive Disorder / Q000453:epidemiology*; D006801:Humans; D009420:Nervous System / Q000254:growth & development