Establishing a Spectrum: Childhood Neglect and Its Association with Varying Neuroanatomy Volume in Healthy Patients

Numerous studies identify how individuals with several psychological disorders, including major depressive disorder and bipolar disorder have smaller neuroanatomy volumes in select areas. These areas include the hippocampus, amygdala, anterior cingulate cortex, nucleus accumbens, frontal pole, and the medial prefrontal cortex. Many of these studies have included measures of negative childhood experiences such as the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ), to show that increased reports of negative experiences are associated with decreased brain volumes and an increased prevalence of psychological disorders. However, a great majority of these studies focus on diseased individuals. Whether higher CTQ scores lead to similarly decreased structural volumes in healthy or neurotypical patients remains unknown. Currently, labeling an individual as ‘diseased’ does not involve any assessment of childhood experiences, and it is not clear to what degree a healthy patient may suffer from some level of disease-like symptoms. This thesis aims to examine healthy patients and establish a spectrum where the increasing prevalence of childhood trauma is negatively associated with neuroanatomy volume using behavioral and neuroimaging analysis.