Weight spectrum and executive function in adolescents: the moderating role of negative emotions

The Relationship Between Temporal Sense and Psychopathologies of College Students with Sensory Impairments: Mediation of Religions

Previous studies on the relationship between temporal sense and negative mental health symptoms have focused primarily on healthy college students, overlooking the role of religion. This study sought to examine the impact of religion on college students with sensory impairment and fill a gap in the research on the relationship between temporal sense and negative mental health symptoms in this population. The results were obtained from a cross sectional survey of 540 participants, including 370 hearing-impaired students and 140 visually impaired students. The survey investigated the mediating effect of religion on the relationship between temporal sense and negative mental health symptoms in impaired students. The rates of negative mental health symptoms (depression, anxiety, and stress) detected were 18.9%, 31.1%, and 2.9%, respectively. Students with different types of sensory impairments showed significant differences in their perception of time. The percentages of students with sensory impairments who attended church and practiced religion were 2.0%, 6.0%, and 1.0%, respectively. The results revealed a significant positive correlation between temporal sense and negative mental health symptoms, with religion serving as a mediating factor.

Neurocognitive correlates of metabolic dysregulation in individuals with mood disorders: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Individuals with mood disorders are predisposed to metabolic dysfunction, while those with metabolic dysregulation such as diabetes and obesity experience more severe depressive symptoms. Both metabolic dysfunction and mood disorders are independently associated with cognitive deficits. Therefore, given their close association, this study aimed to explore the association between metabolic dysfunction in individuals with mood disorders in relation to cognitive outcomes. A comprehensive search comprised of these three domains was carried out; a random-effects meta-analysis pooling mean cognitive outcomes was conducted (PROSPERO ID: CRD42022295765). Sixty-three studies were included in this review; 26 were synthesized in a quantitative meta-analysis. Comorbid metabolic dysregulation was associated with significantly lower global cognition among individuals with mood disorders. These trends were significant within each mood disorder subgroup, including major depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, and self-report depression/depressive symptoms. Type 2 diabetes was associated with the lowest cognitive performance in individuals with mood disorders, followed by peripheral insulin resistance, body mass index ⩾25 kg/m2, and metabolic syndrome. Significant reduction in scores was also observed among individual cognitive domains (in descending order) of working memory, attention, executive function, processing speed, verbal memory, and visual memory. These findings demonstrate the detrimental effects of comorbid metabolic dysfunction in individuals with mood disorders. Further research is required to understand the underlying mechanisms connecting mood disorders, metabolism, and cognition.

Rapid increases in BMI waist to height ratio during adolescence and subsequent neurobehavioral deficits

OBJECTIVE

The aim of this study was to explore prospective relationships between changing patterns of BMI/waist to height ratio (WHtR) during adolescence and subsequent neurobehavioral development.

METHODS

In this prospective cohort study, randomized stratified sampling was used to recruit six middle schools and 609 students in Shanghai, China. In Grades 6, 7, and 9, the Youth Self Report scale was used to assess student neurobehavioral status and anthropometric measurements were conducted to calculate BMI z scores and WHtRs. Longitudinal data were analyzed using latent class mixture modeling to delineate trajectories of BMI z scores ("stable," "decreasing," "rapidly increasing") and WHtRs ("stable," "rapidly increasing"), and their associations with neurobehavioral status in Grade 9 were assessed.

RESULTS

In Grades 6 through 9 (ages 11-15 years), the prevalence of overall obesity and abdominal obesity ranged from 10.7% to 13.0% and 13.0% to 19.8%, respectively. Compared with the stable BMI z score trajectory, the rapidly increasing BMI z score trajectory was longitudinally associated with delinquent behavior, aggressive behavior, and externalizing problems (incidence rate ratio: 1.564-1.613, adjusted p < 0.05). Compared with the stable WHtR trajectory, the rapidly increasing WHtR trajectory significantly predicted increased risks of social problems and delinquent behavior (incidence rate ratios: 1.776-1.967, adjusted p < 0.05). Significant associations of the rapidly increasing BMI z score/WHtR trajectories with subsequent neurobehavioral deficits were observed among girls (adjusted p < 0.05) but not among boys (adjusted p > 0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

Rapid increases in BMI or WHtR during adolescence could predict subsequent neurobehavioral deficits, especially for externalizing behaviors. Timely intervention for weight control may be considered to promote adolescent mental health.

CARE as a wearable derived feature linking circadian amplitude to human cognitive functions

Circadian rhythms are crucial for regulating physiological and behavioral processes. Pineal hormone melatonin is often used to measure circadian amplitude but its collection is costly and time-consuming. Wearable activity data are promising alternative, but the most commonly used measure, relative amplitude, is subject to behavioral masking. In this study, we firstly derive a feature named circadian activity rhythm energy (CARE) to better characterize circadian amplitude and validate CARE by correlating it with melatonin amplitude (Pearson's r = 0.46, P = 0.007) among 33 healthy participants. Then we investigate its association with cognitive functions in an adolescent dataset (Chinese SCHEDULE-A, n = 1703) and an adult dataset (UK Biobank, n = 92,202), and find that CARE is significantly associated with Global Executive Composite (β = 30.86, P = 0.016) in adolescents, and reasoning ability, short-term memory, and prospective memory (OR = 0.01, 3.42, and 11.47 respectively, all P < 0.001) in adults. Finally, we identify one genetic locus with 126 CARE-associated SNPs using the genome-wide association study, of which 109 variants are used as instrumental variables in the Mendelian Randomization analysis, and the results show a significant causal effect of CARE on reasoning ability, short-term memory, and prospective memory (β = -59.91, 7.94, and 16.85 respectively, all P < 0.0001). The present study suggests that CARE is an effective wearable-based metric of circadian amplitude with a strong genetic basis and clinical significance, and its adoption can facilitate future circadian studies and potential intervention strategies to improve circadian rhythms and cognitive functions.

Association between mental health and executive dysfunction and the moderating effect of urban-rural subpopulation in general adolescents from Shangrao, China: a population-based cross-sectional study

OBJECTIVES

To examine the association between mental health and executive dysfunction in general adolescents, and to identify whether home residence and school location would moderate that association.

DESIGN

A population-based cross-sectional study.

SETTING

A subsample of the Shanghai Children's Health, Education, and Lifestyle Evaluation-Adolescents project. 16 sampled schools in Shangrao city located in downstream Yangtze River in southeast China (December 2018).

PARTICIPANTS

1895 adolescents (48.8% male) which were divided into three subpopulations: (A) adolescents who have urban hukou (ie, household registration in China) and attend urban schools (UU, n=292); (B) adolescents who have rural hukou and attend urban schools (RU, n=819) and (C) adolescents who have rural hukou and attend rural schools (RR, n=784).

MEASURES

The Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale-21 was used to assess adolescent mental health symptoms, and the Behaviour Rating Inventory of Executive Function (parent form) was applied to measure adolescent executive dysfunction in nature setting.

RESULTS

Mental health symptoms were common (depression: 25.2%, anxiety: 53.0%, stress: 19.7%) in our sample, and the prevalence rates were lower among UU adolescents than those among the RR and RU, with intersubgroup differences in screen exposure time explaining most of the variance. We found the three types of symptoms were strongly associated with executive dysfunction in general adolescents. We also observed a marginal moderating effect of urban-rural subgroup on the associations: UU adolescents with depression (OR 6.74, 95% CI 3.75 to 12.12) and anxiety (OR 5.56, 95% CI 1.86 to 16.66) had a higher executive dysfunction risk when compared with RR youths with depression (OR 1.93, 95% CI 0.91 to 4.12) and anxiety (OR 1.80, 95% CI 1.39 to 2.33), respectively.

CONCLUSIONS

Rural adolescents experienced more mental health symptoms, whereas urban individuals with mental health problems had a higher executive dysfunction risk.