Cortical thinning and hippocampal expansion as brain signatures of ADHD symptom trajectories

Abstract

Clinical heterogeneity in ADHD symptom trajectories is well-documented, but their neurodevelopmental mechanisms remain unclear. We used a longitudinal cohort of adolescents (ABCD, n=7,436) to show that persistent, remitting, and emergent ADHD symptom trajectories correlated with persistent, improving, and worsening behavioral changes, respectively. Each trajectory had distinct brain signatures: faster cortical thinning (persistence), slower thinning (emergence), and faster subcortical expansion (remission). Slower cortical thinning in the right posterior cingulate was associated with inattention symptom increase, while faster hippocampal expansion associated with inattention symptom decrease. These signatures enhance ADHD symptom prediction at age 13 and generalize to young adults (age 23) in the IMAGEN cohort. The hippocampal signature for remitting symptoms was replicated in IMAGEN and two clinical cohorts (ADHD-200, ADHD-1000). Given that baseline ADHD medication use was not significantly associated with the remitting trajectory, our findings suggest that current treatments may not facilitate sustained remission, highlighting the potential for new interventions.

More information

Identifiers

Catalogue record

Export record

ASCII CitationAtomBibTeXData Cite XMLDublin CoreDublin CoreEP3 XMLEndNoteHTML CitationHTML CitationHTML ListJSONMETSMODSMPEG-21 DIDLOpenURL ContextObjectOpenURL ContextObject in SpanRDF+N-TriplesRDF+N3RDF+XMLRIOXX2 XMLReferReference ManagerSimple Metadata

Altmetrics