The impact of early adversity on the cerebral cortex - a Mendelian randomization study
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Background The early adversity is associated with a series of negative outcomes in adulthood, and the impact on the cerebral cortex may be one of the fundamental causes of these adverse consequences in adulthood. In this study, we aim to investigate the causal relationship between early adversity and changes in cerebral cortex structure using Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis. Methods The GWAS summary statistics of 6 early adversity traits were obtained from individuals of European ancestry in the UK Biobank. The GWAS summary statistics of 34 known functional cortical regions were obtained from the ENIGMA Consortium. Causal relationships between the adversity factors and brain cortical structure were assessed using the inverse-variance weighted (IVW), MR-Egger, and weighted median methods, with IVW being the primary evaluation method. Cochran’s Q-test, MR-PRESSO, leave-one-out analysis, and funnel plot examination were employed to detect potential heterogeneity and pleiotropy, as well as to identify and exclude outliers. Results At a global level, no causal relationship was found between early adversity and cortical thickness (TH) or surface area (SA) of the brain. However, at the regional level, early adversity was found to potentially influence the TH of the caudal anterior cingulate, superior temporal, entorhinal, paracentral, lateral occipital, banks of the superior temporal sulcus, and supramarginal regions, as well as the SA of the pars triangularis, lateral occipital, parahippocampal, medial orbitofrontal, and isthmus cingulate regions. All findings were nominally significant and passed sensitivity analyses, with no significant heterogeneity or pleiotropy detected. Discussion Our study provides evidence for the association between early adversity and alterations in brain cortical structure, which may serve as a foundation for certain mental disorders. Furthermore, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) might be considered as a promising tool to aid healthcare professionals in identifying individuals with a history of adverse experiences, allowing for early interventions.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.021 | 0.041 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.002 | 0.003 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.004 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".