Michal Zachary S, Marquardt Craig A, Krueger Robert F, Arbisi Paul A, Venables Noah C
Minneapolis Veterans Affairs Health Care System.
Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Minnesota.
Psychol Med. 2025 Jan 9:1-10. doi: 10.1017/S0033291724002265.
Childhood adversity has been associated with increased peripheral inflammation in adulthood. However, not all individuals who experience early adversity develop these inflammatory outcomes. Separately, there is also a link between various internalizing emotional distress conditions (e.g. depression, anxiety, and fear) and inflammation in adulthood. It is possible the combination of adult emotional distress and past childhood adversity may be uniquely important for explaining psychopathology-related immune dysfunction at midlife.
Using data from the Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) study ( = 1255), we examined whether internalizing, defined as past 12-month emotional distress symptomatology and trait neuroticism, moderated associations between childhood adversity and heightened inflammation in adulthood. Using latent variable modeling, we examined whether transdiagnostic or disorder-specific features of emotional distress better predicted inflammation.
We observed that childhood adversity only predicted adult inflammation when participants also reported adult internalizing emotional distress. Furthermore, this moderation effect was specific to the transdiagnostic factor of emotional distress rather than the disorder-specific features.
We discuss the possibility that adult internalizing symptoms and trait neuroticism together may signal the presence of temporally stable vulnerabilities that amplify the impact of childhood adversity on midlife immune alterations. The study highlights the importance of identifying emotional distress in individuals who have experienced childhood adversity to address long-term immune outcomes and enhance overall health.
童年逆境与成年期外周炎症增加有关。然而，并非所有经历过早逆境的个体都会出现这些炎症性结果。另外，各种内化性情绪困扰状况（如抑郁、焦虑和恐惧）与成年期炎症之间也存在联系。成年期情绪困扰与过去童年逆境的结合可能对于解释中年期与精神病理学相关的免疫功能障碍具有独特的重要性。
利用美国中年（MIDUS）研究（n = 1255）的数据，我们研究了以内化性（定义为过去12个月的情绪困扰症状和特质神经质）是否调节了童年逆境与成年期炎症加剧之间的关联。使用潜在变量模型，我们研究了情绪困扰的跨诊断或特定障碍特征是否能更好地预测炎症。
我们观察到，只有当参与者同时报告成年期内化性情绪困扰时，童年逆境才会预测成年期炎症。此外，这种调节效应特定于情绪困扰的跨诊断因素，而非特定障碍特征。
我们讨论了成年期内化症状和特质神经质可能共同表明存在时间上稳定的易感性，这些易感性会放大童年逆境对中年免疫改变的影响。该研究强调了识别经历过童年逆境的个体中的情绪困扰对于解决长期免疫结果和促进整体健康的重要性。
