Emotional non-acceptance links early life stress and blunted cortisol reactivity to social threat

Cărnuţă, M.; Crişan, Liviu G.; Vulturar, Romana; Opre, Adrian; Miu, Andrei C.

doi:10.1016/j.psyneuen.2014.09.026

Cited by 38 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 63 publications

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“…To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to demonstrate this relationship between ANS and HPA activity for individuals with ASD. The inverse relationship between RSA and salivary cortisol extends previous findings in TD adults [Cărnuţă, Crişan, Vulturar, Opre, & Miu, ], but not adolescents [Oldehinkel et al, ]. Heterogeneity in findings may be due to differing degrees of pubertal development across samples (i.e., peripubertal vs. pubertal), or differing maturational trajectories of the ANS versus the HPA axis [van den Bos & Westernberg, ].…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

Salivary cortisol and behavioral response to social evaluative threat in adolescents with autism spectrum disorder

2016

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Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by deficits in social behavior. One possible explanation for social communication deficits in ASD could be differences in biological systems that support responses to environmental stimuli. If so, it is unclear if differences in the arousal response to social stimuli in ASD are due to reduced interest in social information, or to an increased stress response. The hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis facilitates arousal and the stress response to sensory input, including social stimuli. Previous research shows blunted cortisol response to social evaluative threat in children with ASD. The majority of prior work has focused on children with ASD, but adolescents with ASD are understudied. The adolescent period is of interest, as this developmental epoch is associated with increased salience of social evaluative threat in typically developing (TD) populations. In this study, we employed the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST), a laboratory paradigm that involves exposure to social evaluative threat, to study the cortisol and behavioral response to social evaluative threat in ASD and TD adolescents. Salivary cortisol data were collected at six time points before and after the TSST. Behavioral data were collected using video recordings of the TSST, which were then operationalized and coded. Paired sample t-tests were used to calculate within-group cortisol response to the TSST. Cortisol significantly increased in response to the TSST in the TD group but not the ASD group. The TD group showed a trend for more self-soothing behaviors during the stressor than the ASD group. The lack of a cortisol response to the TSST in the ASD group suggests that the TSST is not interpreted as stressful or salient for ASD adolescents. Autism Res 2017, 10: 346-358. © 2016 International Society for Autism Research, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 79%

Salivary cortisol and behavioral response to social evaluative threat in adolescents with autism spectrum disorder

2016

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“…Childhood trauma was investigated using a Romanian translation of the Childhood Traumatic Events Scale [31], which was successfully used in previous studies (e.g., [39]). This self-report measure assesses several types of traumatic events experienced before age 17 (or until the present in participants of younger ages): (1) death of a very close friend or family member; (2) major upheaval between parents, such as separation or divorce; (3) sexual abuse, such as rape or molestation; (4) violent events, such as physical abuse, mugging or assault; and (5) severe illness or injury.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individual Differences in Emotion Regulation, Childhood Trauma and Proneness to Shame and Guilt in Adolescence

Szentágotai‐Tătar

Miu

2016

PLoS ONE

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Dispositional shame and guilt have been associated with psychopathology and an increasing number of studies have traced this relation back to adolescence. This developmental period is thought to be characterized by maturational changes in emotion regulation, which also play an important role in vulnerability to psychopathology, but little is known about the links between emotion regulation and dispositional shame and guilt. The current study investigated the relations between individual differences in the habitual use of a wide range of emotion regulation strategies and proneness to shame and guilt in a large sample of adolescents (N = 706), aged 13 to 17 years. History of childhood trauma was also assessed. Our results showed that emotion regulation independently explained about 20% of the variance of shame-proneness and guilt-proneness. Higher use of maladaptive (e.g., Self-Blaming, Catastrophizing) and lower use of adaptive (e.g., Refocus on Planning, Positive Reappraisal) emotion regulation strategies were positively associated with shame-proneness. In contrast, lower use of maladaptive (e.g., Catastrophizing, Blaming Others) and higher use of adaptive (e.g., Refocus on Planning, Positive Reappraisal) emotion regulation strategies were associated with guilt-proneness, independent of the influence of childhood trauma, which also explained a relatively minor portion of guilt-proneness. Although there were age differences (i.e., rumination was used more by older adolescents, and the influence of emotion regulation on depression and anxiety symptoms increased with age) and sex differences (i.e., girls reported higher use of Putting into Perspective and Other Blaming compared to boys) in emotion regulation, age and sex were not significantly associated with proneness to shame and guilt. The positive relations with maladaptive emotion regulation underscores the dysfunctional nature of shame-proneness. Future studies could use longitudinal measures to establish that emotion regulation drives dispositional shame and guilt, and also investigate whether emotion regulation optimization is able to normalize proneness to shame and guilt and reduce risk for psychopathology.

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“…One interesting suggestion is that autonomic blunting does eventually follow limbic/HPA blunting, and hypothalamic dysfunction is the trigger for primary motivational and emotional dysregulation that subsequently develops into poor peripheral homeostasis (Cărnuţă et al, 2015). Thus, if HPA axis dysregulation represents a primary level of physiological dysfunction in repressors, it may be that cortisol offers a clearer window into changes specifically associated with the stress response than ANS measures do.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Repressors exhibit lower cortisol reactivity to group psychosocial stress

Oskis

Flynn

Clow

2019

Psychoneuroendocrinology

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Emotional non-acceptance links early life stress and blunted cortisol reactivity to social threat

Cited by 38 publications

References 63 publications

Salivary cortisol and behavioral response to social evaluative threat in adolescents with autism spectrum disorder

Salivary cortisol and behavioral response to social evaluative threat in adolescents with autism spectrum disorder

Individual Differences in Emotion Regulation, Childhood Trauma and Proneness to Shame and Guilt in Adolescence

Repressors exhibit lower cortisol reactivity to group psychosocial stress

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