Panel discussion: Effective bullying intervention

This panel discussion was one of the sessions in the International Multidisciplinary Perspective Research in Education and Social Sciences (IMPRESS21) conference that took place on 7-9 September 2021. The panel discussion focused on the concept of bullying, various types of bullying, awareness of bullying among children, the role of different contenders in bullying, and effective prevention strategies for bullying problems. The panel members were Professor Sefa Bulut (Ibn Haldun University, Başakşehir, Istanbul, Turkey) whose work focuses on the trauma and school violence relationship. The second panelist was Assistant Prof. Thseen Nazir (Ibn Haldun University, Başakşehir, Istanbul, Turkey), whose specialization focus on school bullying, role of different contenders and culture in bullying behavior, and prevention studies and the third panelist was Assistant Prof. Nadire Yildiz (Istanbul Medipol University) whose research interest focuses on mentorship programs with at-risk youth as a preventive intervention strategy. The panel discussion provided a conceptualization and understanding of bullying concepts and their prevention for school-age children. The panelists provided some insight into the nature of bullying, the underlying problems, causes, and consequences of the problems, and the effective prevention and evidence-based prevention programs for school-age children

Media Violence Effects on Brain Development: What Neuroimaging Has Revealed and What Lies Ahead

Substantial research has indicated that media violence induces both short- and long-term increases in aggressive thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. Recently, neuroimaging techniques have begun to identify the mechanisms driving these changes. An important avenue that these neuroimaging tools can address is how exposure to media violence in childhood affects brain development, which can have lifelong behavioral consequences. This review highlights neuroimaging research examining how media violence exposure affects the pediatric brain. While such research is limited, evidence suggests that prefrontal mechanisms for controlling emotion and behavior are altered by exposure to violent media. Therefore, long-term increases in aggression and decreases in inhibitory control due to excessive media violence exposure may result from impaired development of prefrontal regions. However, additional neuroimaging research is necessary to establish whether and how exposure to media violence specifically shapes subsequent neural maturation. To optimize the use of neuroimaging in this inquiry, imaging studies should not stand on their own, but instead must be integrated with more traditional research paradigms to establish a more complete picture of effects. Future research must employ more longitudinal approaches to better characterize long-term effects that high exposure to violent screen media may have on brain development, particularly prefrontal and limbic brain regions

Childhood Adversity Linked to Neurological Circuitry Changes and Mental Health Disorders. Narrative Review

Children who experience adversity have increased risk for psychiatric disorders. However, little is known about the exact alterations that occur in the neural circuitry and how that information may help lead to early diagnosis or preventive medicine. Research has shown that there are specific changes in neurological functional connectivity in the brain associated with childhood adversity. This review will examine recent papers that have investigated the correlation between these changes in brain connectivity and specific psychiatric disorders. Understanding the changes may help with preventive medicine by ensuring clinicians monitor patients with more severe history of adversity who are therefore at higher risk for developing a psychiatric disorder. This paper will also address potential recommendations that could be implemented in the future as research offers more conclusive evidence. Research is now beginning to address the questions of whether these changes can be attenuated, either during childhood or as adults

The Relationship Between Child Adversity, Anxiety Symptoms and White Matter Integrity

Chronic activation of the stress response during childhood has been proposed to cause long-term maladaptive changes to the structure of stress response systems, resulting in chronic mental illness. This study helps us to understand how maltreatment in children is associated with differences in white matter integrity and how these factors relate to anxiety symptoms in children. Using Diffusional Kurtosis Imaging data, we examined 106 participants, aged 7-16. Approximately half of the participants were recruited through the Department for Children and Families, and had experienced at least one out-of-home placement following a verified instance of abuse or neglect. Associations between white matter integrity, environmental stressors, and anxiety symptoms were assessed. This study found that specific anxiety symptoms associated with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder were associated with FA reductions. In addition, levels of general adversity and intrafamilial violence were both associated with Fractional Anisotropy reductions. Understanding the mechanisms by which early adversity is linked to long-term psychiatric outcomes is the first step in designing interventions for this vulnerable population

Structural and Functional Brain Abnormalities Associated With Exposure to Different Childhood Trauma Subtypes: A Systematic Review of Neuroimaging Findings

Background: Childhood trauma subtypes sexual abuse, physical abuse, emotional maltreatment, and neglect may have differential effects on the brain that persist into adulthood. A systematic review of neuroimaging findings supporting these differential effects is as yet lacking.Objectives: The present systematic review aims to summarize the findings of controlled neuroimaging trials regarding long-term differential effects of trauma subtypes on the human brain.Methods: A systematic literature search was performed using the PubMed and PsycINFO databases from January 2017 up to and including January 2018. Additional papers were identified by a manual search in the reference lists of selected papers and of relevant review articles retrieved by the initial database search. Studies were then assessed for eligibility by the first author. Only original human studies directly comparing neuroimaging findings of exposed and unexposed individuals to well-defined emotional, physical or sexual childhood maltreatment while controlling for the effects of other subtypes were included. A visual summary of extracted data was made for neuroimaging modalities for which comparison between trauma subtypes was feasible, taking the studies' numbers and sample sizes into account.Results: The systematic literature search yielded 25 publications. Sexual abuse was associated with structural deficits in the reward circuit and genitosensory cortex and amygdalar hyperreactivity during sad autobiographic memory recall. Emotional maltreatment correlated with abnormalities in fronto-limbic socioemotional networks. In neglected individuals, white matter integrity and connectivity were disturbed in several brain networks involved in a variety of functions. Other abnormalities, such as reduced frontal cortical volume, were common to all maltreatment types.Conclusions: There is some evidence for long-term differential effects of trauma subtypes on the human brain. The observed alterations may result from both protective adaptation of and damage to the brain following exposure to threatening life events. Though promising, the current evidence is incomplete, with few brain regions and neuroimaging modalities having been investigated in all subtypes. The comparability of the available evidence is further limited by the heterogeneity of study populations regarding gender, age and comorbid psychopathology. Future neuroimaging studies should take this potentially differential role of childhood trauma subtypes into account

Anatomical and Neurochemical Correlates of Parental Verbal Abuse: A Combined MRS—Diffusion MRI Study

Despite the critical impact of parental dialog on children who remain physically and psychologically dependent, most studies have focused on brain alterations in people exposed to moderate-to-high levels of emotional maltreatment with/without psychopathology. We measured metabolites in the pregenual anterior cingulate cortex (pgACC) acquired with single-voxel proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy and anatomical connectivity assessed with probabilistic tractography in 46 healthy young adults who experienced no-to-low level parental verbal abuse (paVA) during their childhood and adolescence. The partial least square regression (PLSR) model showed that individual variance of perceived paVA was associated with chemical properties and structural connectivity of pregenual anterior cingulate cortex (pgACC; prediction R2 = 0.23). The jackknife test was used to identify features that significantly contributed to the partial least square regression (PLSR) model; a negative association of paVA was found with myo-inositol concentration, anatomical connectivities with the right caudate and with the right transverse temporal gyrus. Of note, positive associations were also found with the left pars triangularis, left cuneus, right inferior temporal cortex, right entorhinal cortex and right amygdala. Our results showing both a negative association of frontal glial function and positive associations of anatomical connectivities in several networks associated with threat detection or visual information processing suggest both anatomical and neurochemical adaptive changes in medial frontolimbic networks to low-level paVA experiences

Adverse Childhood Experiences and the Consequences on Neurobiological, Psychosocial, and Somatic Conditions Across the Lifespan

Introduction: Adverse childhood experiences (ACE) such as sexual and physical abuse or neglect are frequent in childhood and constitute a massive stressor with long-lasting adverse effects on the brain, mental and physical health.The aim of this qualitative review is to present a concise overview of the present literature on the impact of ACE on neurobiology, mental and somatic health in later adulthood.Methods: The authors reviewed the existing literature on the impact of ACE on neurobiology, mental and somatic health in later adulthood and summarized the results for a concise qualitative overview.Results: In adulthood, the history of ACE can result in complex clinical profiles with several co-occurring mental and somatic disorders such as posttraumatic stress disorder, depression, borderline personality disorder, obesity and diabetes. Although a general stress effect in the development of the disorders and neural alterations can be assumed, the role of type and timing of ACE is of particular interest in terms of prevention and treatment of ACE-related mental and somatic conditions. It has been suggested that during certain vulnerable developmental phases the risk for subsequent ACE-related disorders is increased. Moreover, emerging evidence points to sensitive periods and specificity of ACE-subtypes in the development of neurobiological alterations, e.g., volumetric and functional changes in the amygdala and hippocampus.Conclusion: Longitudinal studies are needed to investigate complex ACE-related characteristics and mechanisms relevant for mental and somatic disorders by integrating state of the art knowledge and methods. By identifying and validating psychosocial and somatic risk factors and diagnostic markers one might improve the development of innovative somatic and psychological treatment options for individuals suffering from ACE-related disorders

Beyond ‘witnessing’: children’s experiences of coercive control in domestic violence and abuse

Children’s experiences and voices are underrepresented in academic literature and professional practice around domestic violence and abuse. The project ‘Understanding Agency and Resistance Strategies’ addresses this absence, through direct engagement with children. We present an analysis from interviews with 21 children in the United Kingdom (12 girls and 9 boys, aged 8-18 years), about their experiences of domestic violence and abuse, and their responses to this violence. These interviews were analysed using interpretive interactionism. Three themes from this analysis are presented: a) ‘Children’s experiences of abusive control’, which explores children’s awareness of controlling behaviour by the adult perpetrator, their experience of that control, and its impact on them; b) ‘Constraint’, which explores how children experience the constraint associated with coercive control in situations of domestic violence, and c) ‘Children as agents’ which explores children’s strategies for managing controlling behaviour in their home and in family relationships. The paper argues that, in situations where violence and abuse occurs between adult intimate partners, children are significantly impacted, and can be reasonably described as victims of abusive control. Recognising children as direct victims of domestic violence and abuse would produce significant changes in the way professionals respond to them, by 1) recognising children’s experience of the impact of domestic violence and abuse; 2) recognising children’s agency, undermining the perception of them as passive ‘witnesses’ or ‘collateral damage’ in adult abusive encounters; and 3) strengthening professional responses to them as direct victims, not as passive witnesses to violence