Adolescence represents a period of risk for developing patterns of risk-taking and conduct problems, and the quality of the family environment is one robust predictor of such externalizing behavior. However, family factors may not affect all youth uniformly, and individual differences in neurobiological susceptibility to the family context may moderate its influence. The current study investigated brain-based individual differences in social motivational processing as a susceptibility marker to family conflict in predicting externalizing behavior in early adolescent youth. 163 adolescents (M_age = 12.87 years) completed an fMRI scan during which they anticipated social rewards and social punishments. For adolescents with heightened ventral striatum and amygdala blood oxygen-level dependent (BOLD) response during the anticipation of social rewards and heightened ventral striatum BOLD response during the anticipation of social punishments, higher levels of family conflict were associated with greater externalizing behavior. BOLD response when anticipating both social rewards and punishments suggested increased susceptibility to maladaptive family contexts, highlighting the importance of considering adolescent social motivation in positive and negatively valenced contexts.

青春期代表了发展冒险模式和行为问题的风险时期，家庭环境的质量是这种外化行为的一个强有力的预测因素。然而，家庭因素可能不会对所有青少年产生一致的影响，并且家庭环境对神经生物学易感性的个体差异可能会缓和其影响。目前的研究调查了社会动机处理中基于大脑的个体差异，作为预测青少年早期外化行为的家庭冲突易感性标志。163 青少年（M_年龄= 12.87 年）完成了 fMRI 扫描，在此期间他们预期社会奖励和社会惩罚。对于在预期社会奖励期间腹侧纹状体和杏仁核血氧水平依赖性（BOLD）反应增强以及在预期社会惩罚期间腹侧纹状体BOLD反应增强的青少年，较高水平的家庭冲突与较大的外化行为相关。当预期社会奖励和惩罚时，大胆的反应表明对适应不良的家庭环境的敏感性增加，突出了在积极和消极的价值环境中考虑青少年社会动机的重要性。