Effects of intranasal oxytocin administration on memory for infant cues: Moderation by childhood emotional maltreatment

Evaluating the neuropeptide-social cognition link in ageing: the mediating role of basic cognitive skills

The roles of oxytocin (OT) and arginine-vasopressin (AVP) as crucial modulators of social cognition and related behaviours have been extensively addressed in the literature. The involvement of these neuropeptides in social cognition in ageing, however, and a potential mediating effect of basic cognitive capacities on this link, are not well understood. To fill these research gaps, this study assessed associations of plasma OT and AVP levels with dynamic emotion identification accuracy in generally healthy older men (aged 55-95 years) and probed the underlying roles of crystallized and fluid cognition in these associations. Higher plasma OT levels were associated with lower accuracy in dynamic emotion identification, with this negative relationship fully mediated by cognition. For plasma AVP levels, in contrast, there was no association with dynamic emotion identification accuracy. Integrated within existing theoretical accounts, results from this study advance understanding of the neuropeptide-social cognition link in ageing and support basic cognitive capacities as mediators in this association. This article is part of the theme issue 'Interplays between oxytocin and other neuromodulators in shaping complex social behaviours'.

Intranasal oxytocin administration improves mood in new mothers with moderate low mood but not in mothers with elevated symptoms of postnatal depression: A randomised controlled trial

BACKGROUND

Oxytocin (OT) is a neuropeptide hormone that has anxiolytic and antidepressant effects, and positive effects on social affiliation and behaviour, particularly in parenting and attachment relationships. In women with postnatal depression (PND), each of these are reduced. This study investigated if OT administration reduces low mood in new mothers with PND and across the low mood spectrum.

DESIGN

A double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomised controlled-trial, within-subjects, cross-over design was conducted.

PARTICIPANTS

Mothers (N = 58) between 3 and 9 months postpartum. Participants were screened for traits of PND on the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) and assigned into 2 groups: probable PND cases (N = 26, scoring ≥9) and controls (N = 32, scoring ≤9).

METHOD

Participants rated their current mood on the Positive and Negative Affect Scale (PANAS) at Baseline (before nasal administration), Condition 1 (after first OT/Placebo administration) and Condition 2 (after second OT/Placebo administration).

RESULTS

OT administration did not affect mood in women with PND scores above the cut-off point but significantly reduced negative mood in those scoring below the cut-off point. To explore if a subgroup was driving this, we compared participants with mild, moderate and severe scores on the EPDS. OT administration significantly reduced negative mood in women with moderate low mood scores on the EPDS.

LIMITATIONS

PND was assessed by the EPDS, rather than a clinical diagnosis.

CONCLUSION

These results illustrate individual differences in response to OT administration and suggest that OT administration may offer treatment benefit to new mothers who report moderate sub-clinical levels of depression.

The Power of Smiling: The Adult Brain Networks Underlying Learned Infant Emotionality

The perception of infant emotionality, one aspect of temperament, starts to form in infancy, yet the underlying mechanisms of how infant emotionality affects adult neural dynamics remain unclear. We used a social reward task with probabilistic visual and auditory feedback (infant laughter or crying) to train 47 nulliparous women to perceive the emotional style of six different infants. Using functional neuroimaging, we subsequently measured brain activity while participants were tested on the learned emotionality of the six infants. We characterized the elicited patterns of dynamic functional brain connectivity using Leading Eigenvector Dynamics Analysis and found significant activity in a brain network linking the orbitofrontal cortex with the amygdala and hippocampus, where the probability of occurrence significantly correlated with the valence of the learned infant emotional disposition. In other words, seeing infants with neutral face expressions after having interacted and learned their various degrees of positive and negative emotional dispositions proportionally increased the activity in a brain network previously shown to be involved in pleasure, emotion, and memory. These findings provide novel neuroimaging insights into how the perception of happy versus sad infant emotionality shapes adult brain networks.

Experimental manipulation of infant temperament affects amygdala functional connectivity

In this functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study we examined neural processing of infant faces associated with a happy or a sad temperament in nulliparous women. We experimentally manipulated adult perception of infant temperament in a probabilistic learning task. In this task, participants learned about an infant's temperament through repeated pairing of the infant face with positive or negative facial expressions and vocalizations. At the end of the task, participants were able to differentiate between “mostly sad” infants who cried often and “mostly happy” infants who laughed often. Afterwards, brain responses to neutral faces of infants with a happy or a sad temperament were measured with fMRI and compared to brain responses to neutral infants with no temperament association. Our findings show that a brief experimental manipulation of temperament can change brain responses to infant signals. We found increased amygdala connectivity with frontal regions and the visual cortex, including the occipital fusiform gyrus, during the perception of infants with a happy temperament. In addition, amygdala connectivity was positively related to the post-manipulation ratings of infant temperament, indicating that amygdala connectivity is involved in the encoding of the rewarding value of an infant with a happy temperament.

Association between maternal childhood maltreatment and mother-infant attachment disorganization: Moderation by maternal oxytocin receptor gene and cortisol secretion

This study examined maternal oxytocin receptor (OXTR, rs53576) genotype and cortisol secretion as moderators of the relation between maternal childhood maltreatment history and disorganized mother-infant attachment in the Strange Situation Procedure (SSP). A community sample of 314 mother-infant dyads completed the SSP at infant age 17 months. Self-reported maltreatment history more strongly predicted mother-infant attachment disorganization score and disorganized classification for mothers with more plasticity alleles of OXTR (G), relative to mothers with fewer plasticity alleles. Maltreatment history also more strongly predicted mother-infant attachment disorganization score and classification for mothers with higher SSP cortisol secretion, relative to mothers with lower SSP cortisol secretion. Findings indicate that maltreatment history is related to disorganization in the next generation, but that this relation depends on maternal genetic characteristics and cortisol.

Oxytocin and Human Sensitive and Protective Parenting

In this chapter we review the evidence for the role of oxytocin in parenting, and discuss some crucial but outstanding questions. This is not meant to be a comprehensive review of all studies on oxytocin and parenting in general. Instead, special attention will be paid to a dimension of parenting that has been largely neglected in behavioral and neurobiological research on parental caregiving, namely protection. Parental protection has received considerable attention in animal research but, despite its evolutionary importance, not in studies on humans. It is argued that oxytocin may have specific significance for the protective dimension of parenting. The effects of exogenous oxytocin may be dependent not only on contextual factors, but also on personal characteristics, most notably gender, on endogenous levels of oxytocin, and on early childhood experiences. Examining the contextual, personal, hormonal, neural, genetic, and behavioral mechanisms of protective parenting in tandem is essential for the development of a comprehensive theory of protective parenting, and for the identification of "biomarkers" for insensitive and unprotective parenting that should be taken into account in preventive parenting interventions.

Psychophysiological effects of oxytocin on parent-child interactions: A literature review on oxytocin and parent-child interactions

Oxytocin (OT), often called the 'hormone of love' or 'hormone of attachment,' plays a fundamental role in the establishment and quality of parent-infant bonding. However, emerging evidence indicates that OT can also produce antisocial behavior. To clarify these effects, we review studies examining the role of endogenous and exogenous OT on several determinants of attachment: parental sensitivity, and bonding or synchrony in parent-child dyads. Contextual and individual factors moderating the effect of intranasal OT and its peripheral levels are also reviewed. Finally, potential therapeutic applications for OT and current limitations in human OT research are examined. This systematic literature review was based on the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, with two electronic databases and other bibliographic sources. We identified a total of 47 relevant studies for inclusion in our review. Most of the findings are in accordance with recent ideas that OT administration may increase parent-child prosocial interaction, showing that OT exerts beneficial effects on processes thought to promote bonding, sensitivity, and synchrony. However, we found that OT can induce antisocial behavior (e.g., anxiety) or adverse effects (modulation of maternal care recollections) that are moderated by different contextual (e.g., maltreatment level, presence of unfamiliar people) and individual (attachment style) factors. This review reinforces the importance of context- and individual-dependent factors, which must be taken into account when analyzing the psychophysiological effects of OT.

Beyond Reactive Attachment Disorder: How Might Attachment Research Inform Child Psychiatry Practice?

This article provides an updated review of attachment research with a focus on how comprehensive clinical assessment and intervention informs the care of young children. Child psychiatrists can serve as an important part of care coordination teams working with young children who have histories of early maltreatment and/or disruption in caregiving whether or not the children they are seeing meet criteria for an attachment disorder. Child psychiatrists should be familiar with both comprehensive assessment and the recent attachment-based interventions and appreciate how pharmacotherapy can be a useful adjunctive intervention when intensive therapy alone is ineffective.

Oxytocin and Facial Emotion Recognition

The expression of emotion in faces serves numerous meaningful functions, such as conveying messages of danger or approach, facilitating communication, and promoting the formation of social bonds and relationships. The study of facial expressions of emotion has become integral to research in social psychology and social neuroscience, particularly with respect to the neuropeptide oxytocin. This chapter examines how oxytocin influences the processing of emotion in faces by reviewing intranasal administration studies of automatic processing, selective attention, and emotion recognition. Two important trends in the literature have been identified: exogenous oxytocin attenuates early attentional biases towards negative stimuli and increases selective attention and recognition of emotional cues in faces, particularly around the eyes. Both of these effects can be traced to well-delineated neural circuits involving amygdala, early visual processing areas, and reward circuits, and both purportedly facilitate approach-related behavior when affiliative opportunities are available. These data are integrated into a conceptual model incorporating contextual factors and moderating influences, as oxytocinergic effects on cognition and social behavior appear to vary in persons along indices of social competence, interpersonal sensitivity, and early adversity. Limitations of this literature and future directions for research are briefly discussed.

The endocrinology of human caregiving and its intergenerational transmission

Variation in the quality of parental care has a tremendous impact on a child's social–emotional development. Research investigating the predictors of this variability in human caregiving behavior has mostly focused on learning mechanisms. Evidence is currently accumulating for the complementary underlying role of steroid hormones and neuropeptides. An overview is provided of the hormones and neuropeptides relevant for human caregiving behavior. Then the developmental factors are described that stimulate variability in sensitivity to these hormones and neuropeptides, which may result in variability in the behavioral repertoire of caregiving. The role of genetic variation in neuropeptide and steroid receptors, the role of testosterone and oxytocin during fetal development and parturition, and the impact of experienced caregiving in childhood on functioning of the neuroendocrine stress and oxytocin system are discussed. Besides providing a heuristic framework for further research on the ontogenetic development of human caregiving, a neuroendocrine model is also presented for the intergenerational transmission of caregiving practices. Insight into the underlying biological mechanisms that bring about maladaptive caregiving behavior, such as neglect and insensitive parenting, will hopefully result in more efficient approaches to reduce the high prevalence of such behavior and to minimize the impact on those affected.

On Cuteness: Unlocking the Parental Brain and Beyond

Cuteness in offspring is a potent protective mechanism that ensures survival for otherwise completely dependent infants. Previous research has linked cuteness to early ethological ideas of a 'Kindchenschema' (infant schema) where infant facial features serve as 'innate releasing mechanisms' for instinctual caregiving behaviours. We propose extending the concept of cuteness beyond visual features to include positive infant sounds and smells. Evidence from behavioural and neuroimaging studies links this extended concept of cuteness to simple 'instinctual' behaviours and to caregiving, protection, and complex emotions. We review how cuteness supports key parental capacities by igniting fast privileged neural activity followed by slower processing in large brain networks also involved in play, empathy, and perhaps even higher-order moral emotions.

From Autism to Eating Disorders and More: The Role of Oxytocin in Neuropsychiatric Disorders

Oxytocin (oxy) is a pituitary neuropeptide hormone synthesized from the paraventricular and supraoptic nuclei within the hypothalamus. Like other neuropeptides, oxy can modulate a wide range of neurotransmitter and neuromodulator activities. Additionally, through the neurohypophysis, oxy is secreted into the systemic circulation to act as a hormone, thereby influencing several body functions. Oxy plays a pivotal role in parturition, milk let-down and maternal behavior and has been demonstrated to be important in the formation of pair bonding between mother and infants as well as in mating pairs. Furthermore, oxy has been proven to play a key role in the regulation of several behaviors associated with neuropsychiatric disorders, including social interactions, social memory response to social stimuli, decision-making in the context of social interactions, feeding behavior, emotional reactivity, etc. An increasing body of evidence suggests that deregulations of the oxytocinergic system might be involved in the pathophysiology of certain neuropsychiatric disorders such as autism, eating disorders, schizophrenia, mood, and anxiety disorders. The potential use of oxy in these mental health disorders is attracting growing interest since numerous beneficial properties are ascribed to this neuropeptide. The present manuscript will review the existing findings on the role played by oxy in a variety of distinct physiological and behavioral functions (Figure 1) and on its role and impact in different psychiatric disorders. The aim of this review is to highlight the need of further investigations on this target that might contribute to the development of novel more efficacious therapies. Figure 1

Music training and empathy positively impact adults' sensitivity to infant distress

Crying is the most powerful auditory signal of infant need. Adults' ability to perceive and respond to crying is important for infant survival and in the provision of care. This study investigated a number of listener variables that might impact on adults' perception of infant cry distress, namely parental status, musical training, and empathy. Sensitivity to infant distress was tested using a previously validated task, which experimentally manipulated distress by varying the pitch of infant cries. This task required that participants discriminate between pitch differences and interpret these as differences in infant distress. Parents with musical training showed a significant advantage on this task when compared with parents without. The extent of the advantage was correlated with the amount of self-reported musical training. For non-parents, individual differences in empathy were associated with task performance, with higher empathy scores corresponding to greater sensitivity to infant distress. We suggest that sensitivity to infant distress can be impacted by a number of listener variables, and may be amenable to training.

Long-term exposure to intranasal oxytocin in a mouse autism model

Oxytocin (OT) is a neuropeptide involved in mammalian social behavior. It is currently in clinical trials for the treatment of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Previous studies in healthy rodents (prairie voles and C57BL/6J mice) have shown that there may be detrimental effects of long-term intranasal administration, raising the questions about safety and efficacy. To investigate the effects of OT on the aspects of ASD phenotype, we conducted the first study of chronic intranasal OT in a well-validated mouse model of autism, the BTBR T+ Itpr3tf/J inbred strain (BTBR), which displays low sociability and high repetitive behaviors. BTBR and C57BL/6J (B6) mice (N=94) were administered 0.8  IU/kg of OT intranasally, daily for 30 days, starting on day 21. We ran a well-characterized set of behavioral tasks relevant to diagnostic and associated symptoms of autism, including juvenile reciprocal social interactions, three-chambered social approach, open-field exploratory activity, repetitive self-grooming and fear-conditioned learning and memory, some during and some post treatment. Intranasal OT did not improve autism-relevant behaviors in BTBR, except for female sniffing in the three-chambered social interaction test. Male saline-treated BTBR mice showed increased interest in a novel mouse, both in chamber time and sniffing time, whereas OT-treated male BTBR mice showed a preference for the novel mouse in sniffing time only. No deleterious effects of OT were detected in either B6 or BTBR mice, except possibly for the lack of a preference for the novel mouse's chamber in OT-treated male BTBR mice. These results highlight the complexity inherent in understanding the effects of OT on behavior. Future investigations of chronic intranasal OT should include a wider dose range and early developmental time points in both healthy rodents and ASD models to affirm the efficacy and safety of OT.