Heightened sensitivity to the caregiving environment during adolescence: implications for recovery following early‐life adversity

Abstract

Background Adolescence has been proposed to be a period of heightened sensitivity to environmental influence. If true, adolescence may present a window of opportunity for recovery for children exposed to early‐life adversity. Recent evidence supports adolescent recalibration of stress response systems following early‐life adversity. However, it is unknown whether similar recovery occurs in other domains of functioning in adolescence. Methods We use data from the Bucharest Early Intervention Project – a randomized controlled trial of foster care for children raised in psychosocially depriving institutions – to examine the associations of the caregiving environment with reward processing, executive functioning, and internalizing and externalizing psychopathology at ages 8, 12, and 16 years, and evaluate whether these associations change across development. Results Higher quality caregiving in adolescence was associated with greater reward responsivity and lower levels of internalizing and externalizing symptoms, after covarying for the early‐life caregiving environment. The associations of caregiving with executive function and internalizing and externalizing symptoms varied by age and were strongest at age 16 relative to ages 8 and 12 years. This heightened sensitivity to caregiving in adolescence was observed in both children with and without exposure to early psychosocial neglect. Conclusions Adolescence may be a period of heightened sensitivity to the caregiving environment, at least for some domains of functioning. For children who experience early psychosocial deprivation, this developmental period may be a window of opportunity for recovery of some functions. Albeit correlational, these findings suggest that it may be possible to reverse or remediate some of the lasting effects of early‐life adversity with interventions that target caregiving during adolescence.

A 14-day ecological momentary assessment study on whether resilience and early family risk moderate daily stress and affect on cortisol diurnal slope

“…The simultaneous examination of the relations between resilience capacity, momentary stress, and affect with daily diurnal cortisol slopes remains underexplored. Further, resilience capacity should be most helpful in the presence of risk, which often is not captured in resilience studies 34 . Using retrospective reports of family risk as an index of prior adversity, our study recruited participants from three groups: (1) Resilient, including individuals who originated from risky families and reported high current resilience capacity, (2) Vulnerable, including individuals from risky families but with low reported current resilience capacity, and (3) Control, including individuals with low early family risk and average current symptoms of anxiety and depression.…”

“…Given that the definition of resilience necessitates the presence of adversity, we measured the resilience of our participants against a context of early family life risk and current transitory stress by studying emerging adults at a developmental transition who moved at least interstate often internationally for tertiary studies. Most studies measure resilience based on self-report without the reporting of risks 34 . We also categorized participants from low-risk families into the Control group as demographically similar comparisons.…”

Individual differences in timing of susceptibility to adverse effects of family dysfunction.

“…Critically, some recent evidence—in addition to that highlighted earlier (e.g., Andersen et al, in press)—indicates that this is indeed the case even when early-life adversity is severe. Especially, notable is Colich et al’s (2021) work investigating the adolescent experiences and development of children raised in extremely deprived Romanian orphanages prior to placement in foster care. Results revealed that the higher the quality of caregiving at this later developmental period, the greater the individual’s reward responsivity and the lower the levels of internalizing and externalizing symptoms.…”

Resilience to Early Family Risk Moderates Daily Stress and Affect on Cortisol Diurnal Slope associations: A 14-Day Ecological Momentary Assessment Study

“…The relations between resilience capacity, momentary stress, and affect with daily diurnal cortisol slopes remains underexplored. Further, resilience capacity should be most helpful in the presence of risk, which often is not captured in resilience studies (Colich et al, 2020). Using retrospective reports of family risk as an index of prior adversity, our study recruited participants from three groups: (1) Resilient, including individuals who originated from risky families and reported high current resilience capacity, (2) Vulnerable, including individuals from risky families but with low reported current resilience capacity, and (3) Control, including individuals with low early family risk and average current symptoms of anxiety and depression.…”

“…Given that the de nition of resilience necessitates the presence of adversity, we measured the resilience of our participants against a context of early family life risk and current transitory stress by studying emerging adults at a developmental transition who moved at least interstate often internationally for tertiary studies. Most studies measure resilience based on selfreport without the reporting of risks (Colich et al, 2020). We also categorized participants from low-risk families into the Control group as demographically similar comparisons.…”