Politte-Corn Madison, Myruski Sarah, Cahill Bridget, Pérez-Edgar Koraly, Buss Kristin A
The Pennsylvania State University, Department of Psychology, University Park, PA, USA.
The Pennsylvania State University, Department of Psychology, University Park, PA, USA; The Pennsylvania State University, Department of Human Development and Family Studies, University Park, PA, USA.
Dev Cogn Neurosci. 2025 Apr 24;73:101560. doi: 10.1016/j.dcn.2025.101560.
One of the most reliable predictors of adolescent social anxiety is the temperamental profile of behavioral inhibition (BI), but there is considerable heterogeneity in this association. Resting-state EEG-based neural markers, namely frontal alpha asymmetry and delta-beta coupling (DBC), hold promise for improving our understanding of the relation between BI and social anxiety symptoms during adolescence. The current study aimed to (1) clarify the relation between these neural markers, BI, and social anxiety and (2) examine the moderating role, individually, of frontal alpha asymmetry and DBC on the BI-social anxiety link. Participants were 97 adolescents (M = 14.29 years, SD = .98; 84.4 % White, 3.1 % Black, 12.5 % multiracial; 54.6 % female) and their parents. Parents reported on adolescent BI and adolescents self-reported social anxiety symptoms. Additionally, adolescents provided EEG data across a 6-minute resting task, from which measures of frontal alpha asymmetry and DBC were derived. Results indicated that stronger DBC was directly associated with higher social anxiety symptoms, but not BI, and did not moderate the association between BI and social anxiety. In contrast, frontal alpha asymmetry was not directly associated with either BI or social anxiety but interacted with BI to predict avoidance and distress to social situations, such that greater relative right activation predicted a stronger BI-social anxiety link. However, this effect did not survive correction for multiple comparisons. Findings suggest that high DBC may mark a general vulnerability for social anxiety symptoms, whereas frontal alpha asymmetry may potentiate the risk for social anxiety symptoms specifically among BI youth.
青少年社交焦虑最可靠的预测指标之一是行为抑制（BI）的气质特征，但这种关联存在相当大的异质性。基于静息态脑电图的神经标志物，即额叶α波不对称性和δ-β耦合（DBC），有望增进我们对青少年期BI与社交焦虑症状之间关系的理解。本研究旨在：（1）阐明这些神经标志物、BI和社交焦虑之间的关系；（2）分别考察额叶α波不对称性和DBC对BI与社交焦虑联系的调节作用。参与者为97名青少年（M = 14.29岁，SD = 0.98；84.4%为白人，3.1%为黑人，12.5%为多种族；54.6%为女性）及其父母。父母报告青少年的BI情况，青少年自我报告社交焦虑症状。此外，青少年在一项6分钟的静息任务中提供脑电图数据，从中得出额叶α波不对称性和DBC的测量值。结果表明，较强的DBC与较高的社交焦虑症状直接相关，但与BI无关，且未调节BI与社交焦虑之间的关联。相比之下，额叶α波不对称性与BI或社交焦虑均无直接关联，但与BI相互作用以预测对社交情境的回避和痛苦，即相对右侧激活越强，BI与社交焦虑的联系越强。然而，这一效应在多重比较校正后未保留。研究结果表明，高DBC可能标志着社交焦虑症状的一般易感性，而额叶α波不对称性可能特别增强BI青少年社交焦虑症状的风险。
