Citation

Hill KR, Hsu DT, Taylor SF, Ogden RT, Parsey RV, DeLorenzo C. J. Child Adolesc. Trauma 2022; 15(4): 1105-1112.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2022, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s40653-022-00463-4

PMID

36439668

PMCID

PMC9684394

Abstract

Evidence suggests that adults with a history of childhood maltreatment, the experience of emotional or physical neglect and/or abuse within the family during childhood, have blunted reward and stress processing, and higher risk of depression. The mu opioid receptor rich nucleus accumbens and amygdala are critical to reward and stress processing respectively. We hypothesized that nucleus accumbens and amygdala mu opioid receptor densities and activity (change in receptor binding due to endogenous opioid release or receptor conformation change) were negatively associated with childhood maltreatment in healthy young adults. Maltreatment was assessed with the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ). Healthy participants, n = 75 (52% female) completed [(11)C]carfentanil positron emission tomography imaging labeling mu opioid receptors. The relationship between CTQ score and binding potential (BP(ND), proportional to density of unoccupied receptors) was evaluated with a linear mixed effects model. No significant relationship was found between CTQ score and BP(ND) (f = 3.28; df = 1, 73; p = 0.074) or change in BP(ND) (activity) (t = 1.48; df = 198.3; p = 0.14). This is the first investigation of mu opioid receptors in those with childhood maltreatment. We did not identify a significant relationship between mu opioid receptor dynamics and severity of maltreatment in those without psychopathology. Because this cohort has a low CTQ score average, this may indicate that those with low severity of maltreatment may not have associated changes in mu opioid receptor dynamics. Future directions include evaluating a cohort with increased severity of childhood maltreatment.

Language: en

Keywords

Neuroimaging; Childhood maltreatment; Mu opioid receptors; Positron emission tomography