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Morphometry of the Hippocampus Across the Adult Life-Span in Patients with Depressive Disorders: Association with Neuroticism

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Abstract

Neuroticism is one of the main endophenotypes of major depressive disorder (MDD) and is closely related to the negative effect systems of Research Domain Criteria (RDoC) domains. The relationship between neuroticism and aging is dynamic and complex. Moreover, reduced hippocampal volumes are probably the most frequently reported structural neuroimaging finding associated with MDD. However, it remains unclear to what extent hippocampal abnormalities are linked with age and neuroticism changes in people with depression through the adult life span. This study aimed to examine the interplay between aging and neuroticism on hippocampal morphometric across the adult life-span in a relative large sample of patients with depressive disorders (114 patients, 73 females, age range: 18–74 years) and healthy control (HC) subjects (112 healthy controls, 72 females, age range: 19–72 years). MDD patients showed reduced bilateral hippocampal volumes. The effect of aging on the left hippocampal showed linear and the right hippocampal volume non-linear trajectories throughout the adult life span in healthy groups and MDD groups respectively. The hippocampal atrophy was dynamically impacted by depression at the early stages of adult life. Furthermore, we observed that right hippocampal volume reduction was associated with higher neuroticism in depressive patients younger than 30.65 years old. Our results suggest that the age-related atrophy in the right hippocampal volume was more affected by individual differences in neuroticism among younger depressive patients. Hippocampal volume reduction as a vulnerability factor for early-onset and major geriatric depression may have a distinct endophenotype.

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Data Availability

Data of this research is available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31771231, 32071070), Natural Science Foundation of Chongqing (cstc2019jcyj-msxmX0520, cstc2020jcjy-msxmX0299), the planned project of Chongqing humanities and Social Science (2018PY80, 2019PY51), and Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (SWU119007), Chang Jiang Scholars Program, National Outstanding Young People Plan, Chongqing Talent Program.

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  1. Faculty of Psychology, Southwest University, Chongqing, 400715, China

    Yu Liu, Jie Meng, Kaixiang Zhuang, Qunlin Chen, Wenjing Yang, Jiang Qiu & Dongtao Wei

  2. Key Laboratory of Cognition and Personality (Ministry of Education), Southwest University, Chongqing, 400715, China

    Yu Liu, Jie Meng, Kaixiang Zhuang, Qunlin Chen, Wenjing Yang, Jiang Qiu & Dongtao Wei

  3. Faculty of Psychology, Shandong Normal University, Jinan, 250014, Shandong, China

    Kangcheng Wang

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  1. Yu Liu
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Liu, Y., Meng, J., Wang, K. et al. Morphometry of the Hippocampus Across the Adult Life-Span in Patients with Depressive Disorders: Association with Neuroticism. Brain Topogr 34, 587–597 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10548-021-00846-0

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