Leiden Consortium of Individual Development (L-CID), 2333 AK, Leiden, The Netherlands.
Social and Behavioral Sciences, Erasmus University Rotterdam, 3062 PA, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Sci Rep. 2023 Apr 5;13(1):5600. doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-32754-7.
The COVID-19 pandemic caused a global health crisis with large behavioral effects and serious stress and social consequences. Particularly, teenagers suffered pandemic-related social restrictions including school closures. This study examined whether and how structural brain development was influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic and whether pandemic length was associated with accumulating or resilience effects of brain development. We investigated structural changes in social brain regions (medial prefrontal cortex: mPFC; temporoparietal junction: TPJ) as well as the stress-related hippocampus and amygdala, using a longitudinal design of 2 MRI waves. We selected two age-matched subgroups (9-13 years old), one was tested before (n = 114) and the other during (peri-pandemic group, n = 204) the COVID-19 pandemic. Results indicated that teenagers in the peri-pandemic group showed accelerated development in the mPFC and hippocampus compared to the before-pandemic group. Furthermore, TPJ growth showed immediate effects followed by possibly subsequent recovery effects that returned to a typical developmental pattern. No effects were observed for the amygdala. The findings of this region-of-interest study suggest that experiencing the COVID-19 pandemic measures had accelerating effects on hippocampus and mPFC development but the TPJ showed resilience to negative effects. Follow-up MRI assessments are needed to test acceleration and recovery effects over longer periods.
新冠疫情引发了全球卫生危机，产生了巨大的行为影响和严重的压力及社会后果。尤其是青少年，他们受到了与疫情相关的社会限制，包括学校停课。本研究旨在探讨结构性大脑发育是否受到了新冠疫情的影响，以及疫情持续时间是否与大脑发育的累积或恢复效应有关。我们使用两次 MRI 波的纵向设计，研究了社会脑区（内侧前额叶皮层：mPFC；颞顶联合区：TPJ）以及与应激相关的海马体和杏仁核的结构变化。我们选择了两个年龄匹配的亚组（9-13 岁），一组在新冠疫情之前（n=114）进行了测试，另一组在疫情期间（疫情期间组，n=204）进行了测试。结果表明，与疫情前组相比，疫情期间组的青少年 mPFC 和海马体发育加速。此外，TPJ 的生长表现出即时效应，随后可能出现恢复效应，恢复到典型的发育模式。杏仁核没有观察到效应。这项基于感兴趣区域的研究结果表明，经历新冠疫情措施对海马体和 mPFC 发育有加速效应，但 TPJ 对负面效应具有恢复力。需要进行后续的 MRI 评估，以测试更长时间内的加速和恢复效应。
