The regulatory roles of progesterone and estradiol on emotion processing in women

Rapid nongenomic estrogen signaling controls alcohol drinking behavior in mice

Ovarian-derived estrogen can signal non-canonically at membrane-associated receptors in the brain to rapidly regulate neuronal function. Early alcohol drinking confers greater risk for alcohol use disorder in women than men, and binge alcohol drinking is correlated with high estrogen levels, but a causal role for estrogen in driving alcohol drinking has not been established. We found that female mice displayed greater binge alcohol drinking and reduced avoidance when estrogen was high during the estrous cycle than when it was low. The pro-drinking, but not anxiolytic, effect of high endogenous estrogen occurred via rapid signaling at membrane-associated estrogen receptor alpha in the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis, which promoted synaptic excitation of corticotropin-releasing factor neurons and facilitated their activity during alcohol drinking. Thus, this study demonstrates a rapid, nongenomic signaling mechanism for ovarian-derived estrogen in the brain controlling behavior in gonadally intact females.

"Estrogens and human brain networks: A systematic review of structural and functional neuroimaging studies"

Estrogen fluctuations during the menstrual cycle, puberty, postpartum, or in the menopausal transition are associated with cognitive, affective, and behavioral effects. Additionally, estrogens are essential in hormonal contraception, menopausal hormone therapy, or gender-affirming hormone therapy. This systematic review summarizes findings on the role of estrogens for structure, function, and connectivity of human brain networks. We searched PubMed, Web of Science, and ScienceDirect for neuroimaging articles assessing estrogens published since 2008. We included 54 studies (N = 2,494 participants) on endogenous estrogen, and 28 studies (N = 1740 participants) on exogenous estrogen conditions. Estrogen-related changes were reported for emotion, reward, memory, and resting-state networks, and in regional white and gray matter, with a particular neural plasticity in the hippocampus and amygdala. By examining study designs, imaging measures, and analysis methods, this review highlights the role of neuroimaging in advancing neuroendocrine and neurocognitive research, particularly promoting brain health for women and individuals with ovaries.

Racial Differences in Older Adult's Mental Health and Cognitive Symptomatology: Identifying Subgroups Using Multiple-Group Latent Class Analysis

INTRODUCTION

Little is known on the potential racial differences in latent subgroup membership based on mental health and cognitive symptomatology among older adults.

METHODS

This is a secondary data analysis of Wave 2 data from the National Social Life, Health, and Aging Project (N = 1819). Symptoms were depression, anxiety, loneliness, happiness, and cognition. Multiple-group latent class analysis was conducted to identify latent subgroups based on mental health and cognitive symptoms and to compare these differences between race.

RESULTS

Class 1: "Severe Cognition & Mild-Moderate Mood Impaired," Class 2: "Moderate Cognition & Mood Impaired," and Class 3: "Mild Cognition Impaired & Healthy Mood" were identified. Black older adults were more likely to be in Class 1 while White older adults were more likely to be in Class 2 and Class 3.

DISCUSSION

Clinicians need to provide culturally-sensitive care when assessing and treating symptoms across different racial groups.

Reduced threat avoidance but increased stress induced approach bias in women taking oral contraceptives

Recent research has increasingly acknowledged the impact of oral contraceptives on affective behavior and stress responses; however, the underlying mechanisms are still not well understood. Studies have previously shown that steroid hormones modulate automatic approach and avoidance behavior. Here, we thus investigated the effects of oral contraceptives on approach and avoidance behavior and whether these effects are modulated by stress. The study comprised 130 female participants, half of whom were using oral contraceptives, while the other half were not using any hormonal contraception (NC). The participants completed the Approach Avoidance Task (AAT), which measures automatic approach and avoidance behavior to socio-affective signals. The AAT was run once before and once after a stress manipulation using the Socially Evaluated Cold Pressor Test. OC users showed absent avoidance behavior to social threat signals and a stress-induced increase in approach behavior to positive social signals. The latter was found in particular in women taking androgenic acting OC, demonstrating that different OC preparations need to be taken into account in research on OC effects. However, OC and NC group did not differ in their cortisol stress response. Overall, the results suggest that OC usage impacts on approach and avoidance behavior to social signals, which might also contribute to the development of affective side effects.

Role of estrogen in sex differences in memory, emotion and neuropsychiatric disorders

Estrogen regulates a wide range of neuronal functions in the brain, such as dendritic spine formation, remodeling of synaptic plasticity, cognition, neurotransmission, and neurodevelopment. Estrogen interacts with intracellular estrogen receptors (ERs) and membrane-bound ERs to produce its effect via genomic and non-genomic pathways. Any alterations in these pathways affect the number, size, and shape of dendritic spines in neurons associated with psychiatric diseases. Increasing evidence suggests that estrogen fluctuation causes changes in dendritic spine density, morphology, and synapse numbers of excitatory and inhibitory neurons differently in males and females. In this review, we discuss the role of estrogen hormone in rodents and humans based on sex differences. First, we explain estrogen role in learning and memory and show that a high estrogen level alleviates the deficits in learning and memory. Secondly, we point out that estrogen produces a striking difference in emotional memories in men and women, which leads them to display sex-specific differences in underlying neuronal signaling. Lastly, we discuss that fluctuations in estrogen levels in men and women are related to neuropsychiatric disorders, including schizophrenia, autism spectrum disorder (ASD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), bipolar disorder (BPD), major depressive disorder (MDD), substance use disorder (SUD), and anxiety disorders.

Hormone-based models for comparing menstrual cycle and hormonal contraceptive effects on human resting-state functional connectivity

Oral contraceptives (OCs) are widely used yet understudied given their potential for public health consequences. Emerging investigations scaling from single-subject, dense-sampling neuroimaging studies to population-level metrics have linked OCs to altered brain structure and function. Modeling the hypogonadal, hypergonadal, or mixed state effects of OCs in terms of their impact on hormone action in the brain is a valuable approach to synthesizing results across neuroimaging studies and comparing OC effects to companion findings from research on menstrual cycle phase effects on brain anatomy and function. Resting-state functional connectivity studies provide a powerful tool to evaluate the role of OCs on the intrinsic network connectivity that underlies multiple behavioral domains. The preponderance (but not consensus) of the current literature indicates that (1) as the menstrual cycle proceeds from a low to high progesterone state, prefrontal connectivity increases and parietal connectivity decreases; (2) OCs tend to mimic this connectivity pattern; therefore (3) OCs may produce a hyperprogestogenic state in the brain, in spite of overall reductions in endogenous steroid hormone levels. Alternative models are also considered.

Lower affective empathy in oral contraceptive users: a cross-sectional fMRI study

Evidence accumulates that oral contraceptive (OC) use modulates various socio-affective behaviors, including empathic abilities. Endogenous and synthetic sex hormones, such as estrogens and progestogens, bind to receptor sites in brain regions (i.e. frontal, limbic, and cerebellar) involved in socio-affective processing. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the role of OC use in empathy. In a cross-sectional functional magnetic resonance imaging study, women in different hormonal states, including OC use (n = 46) or being naturally cycling in the early follicular (fNC: n = 37) or peri-ovulatory phase (oNC: n = 28), performed a visual, sentence-based empathy task. Behaviorally, OC users had lower empathy ratings than oNC women. Congruently, whole-brain analysis revealed significantly larger task-related activation of several brain regions, including the left dorsomedial prefrontal gyrus (dmPFG), left precentral gyrus, and left temporoparietal junction in oNC compared to OC women. In OC users, the activity of the left dmPFG and precentral gyrus was negatively associated with behavioral and self-reported affective empathy. Furthermore, empathy-related region-of-interest analysis indicated negative associations of brain activation with synthetic hormone levels in OC women. Overall, this multimodal, cross-sectional investigation of empathy suggests a role of OC intake in especially affective empathy and highlights the importance of including synthetic hormone levels in OC-related analyses.

Hormonal contraceptives as disruptors of competitive behavior: Theoretical framing and review

Emerging evidence suggests that hormonal contraceptives (HCs) impact psychological outcomes through alterations in neurophysiology. In this review, we first introduce a theoretical framework for HCs as disruptors of steroid hormone modulation of socially competitive attitudes and behaviors. Then, we comprehensively examine prior research comparing HC users and non-users in outcomes related to competition for reproductive, social, and financial resources. Synthesis of 46 studies (n = 16,290) led to several key conclusions: HC users do not show the same menstrual cycle-related fluctuations in self-perceived attractiveness and some intrasexual competition seen in naturally-cycling women and, further, may show relatively reduced status- or achievement-oriented competitive motivation. However, there a lack of consistent or compelling evidence that HC users and non-users differ in competitive behavior or attitudes for mates or financial resources. These conclusions are tentative given the notable methodological limitations of the studies reviewed. Implications and recommendations for future research are discussed.

Reversed patterns of resting state functional connectivity for females vs. males in posttraumatic stress disorder

Background

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is twice as prevalent among females as compared to males following potentially traumatic events. While there is evidence for aberrant functional connectivity between hubs of the central executive network (CEN), salience network (SN), and the default mode network (DMN) in PTSD, little is known regarding sex-specificity of this connectivity. The current study aims to directly examine sex-specific resting-state functional connectivity (rs-FC) in trauma exposed males and females, with and without PTSD.

Methods

One hundred and seventy-eight individuals underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) at rest, of them 85 females (45 with PTSD) and 93 males (57 with PTSD). We conducted whole-brain seed-based analysis using CEN (lateral prefrontal cortex [lPFC]), SN (anterior cingulate cortex [ACC], insula, amygdala [AMG]), and DMN (medial prefrontal cortex [mPFC], posterior parietal cortex [PCC], and hippocampus [HIP]) hubs as seed regions. Group-by-Sex ANOVA was conducted.

Results

The amygdala-precuneus, ACC-precuneus, and hippocampus-precuneus pathways exhibited significant group-by-sex interaction effects, with females with PTSD consistently differing in connectivity patterns from males with PTSD and from trauma-exposed healthy females.

Conclusions

Sex-specific neural connectivity patterns were found within and between key nodes of the CEN, DMN, and the SN, suggesting opposite patterns of connectivity in PTSD and trauma-exposed controls as a function of sex as a biological variable (SABV). This may point to mechanistic sex differences in adaptation following trauma and may inform differential neural targets for treatment of females and males with PTSD.