Beta Frontal Lobe Entropy and Infant Sadness Associated with Attention Deficit in Toddlerhood
Poster No:
439
Submission Type:
Abstract Submission
Authors:
Madison Monroe-Mohajerin1, Meghan Puglia1
Institutions:
1University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA
First Author:
Co-Author:
Introduction:
Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a common childhood disorder characterized by impairments in attention, working memory, and inhibitory control. In infants, differences in temperament (a baby's behavioral style in regards to situational reactivity, emotion regulation and expression), are associated with ADHD in later childhood (1). Attentional differences in ADHD are also linked to an increase in neural variability – moment-to-moment electrical fluctuations intrinsic within neuronal networks (4). This project aims to identify associations between infant temperament, neural variability, and ADHD symptoms in early childhood to characterize early markers of attention deficit.
Methods:
122 infants (F = 57, M = 66) initially underwent EEG and parent reported behavioral ratings at 4, 8, and 12 months of age. Participants were re-invited as toddlers at 3-5 years-of-age (M = 38, F = 27), to assess ADHD symptomology. Infant temperament was assessed via the Infant Behavioral Questionnaire (IBQ-R), and ADHD symptomatology was assessed using the ADHD Rating Scale IV.
The EEG paradigm consisted of four conditions, resulting in a 2 × 2 design of social or non-social, visual or auditory stimuli. This project utilizes the social visual condition, which consisted of women turning their heads and smiling. Several studies have reported greater reactivity to visual stimuli in children with ADHD, including larger initial reactions and a lack of habituation (6,9).
Neural noise was computed via multiscale entropy, a measure of temperodynamic neural variability, using the automated preprocessing pipe-line for the estimation of scale-wise entropy from EEG data (APPLESEED) at a scaling rate of 250 Hz (8). Entropy measures irregularity by determining the frequency of a pattern m repeating relative to a pattern of m+1 using the formula [m+1: ln(m/m+1)]. Low entropy designates higher regularity, and high entropy values designate higher irregularity in signal (8). The ROI is the frontal lobe, as infant EEG attention studies have shown sources of brain activity in attentional tasks are scattered in the prefrontal cortex (10).
The EEG paradigm consisted of four conditions, resulting in a 2 × 2 design of social or non-social, visual or auditory stimuli. This project utilizes the social visual condition, which consisted of women turning their heads and smiling. Several studies have reported greater reactivity to visual stimuli in children with ADHD, including larger initial reactions and a lack of habituation (6,9).
Neural noise was computed via multiscale entropy, a measure of temperodynamic neural variability, using the automated preprocessing pipe-line for the estimation of scale-wise entropy from EEG data (APPLESEED) at a scaling rate of 250 Hz (8). Entropy measures irregularity by determining the frequency of a pattern m repeating relative to a pattern of m+1 using the formula [m+1: ln(m/m+1)]. Low entropy designates higher regularity, and high entropy values designate higher irregularity in signal (8). The ROI is the frontal lobe, as infant EEG attention studies have shown sources of brain activity in attentional tasks are scattered in the prefrontal cortex (10).
Results:
Exploratory Graph Analysis (EGA) was used to reduce data dimensionality before performing regression analyses. EGA utilizes the Triangulated Maximally Filtered Graph (TMFG) method which builds a triangulation maximizing a score function associated with the amount of information retained by the network and nodes with the highest sum of correlations (7). It arranges data into a meaningful network structure that can be used for clustering, community detection, and modeling. The Walktrap algorithm utilizes distance metrics based on the strength of the association between nodes, and organizes the nodes into communities (3). Together, TMFG and the Walktrap algorithm identifies latent clusters of variables. EGA identified infant sadness and 13-29 Hz frequency band (beta) as the variables of interest for multivariable regression (Figure 1).
Multivariable regression revealed a significant relationship between infant sadness (β = 1.6477, p < .01), beta frontal lobe entropy (β = -1.7892, p < .05), and ADHD symptomology (F(2 , 50) = 7.02, p = 0.002, adjusted R2 = 0.19). An interaction effect emerged between the variables suggesting infant sadness could act a moderator in the relationship between entropy in infancy and ADHD symptomatology (Figure 2b).
Multivariable regression revealed a significant relationship between infant sadness (β = 1.6477, p < .01), beta frontal lobe entropy (β = -1.7892, p < .05), and ADHD symptomology (F(2 , 50) = 7.02, p = 0.002, adjusted R2 = 0.19). An interaction effect emerged between the variables suggesting infant sadness could act a moderator in the relationship between entropy in infancy and ADHD symptomatology (Figure 2b).
Conclusions:
Results revealed a significant relationship between Beta Frontal Lobe Entropy, IBQ Sadness, and ADHD symptoms. Newer research implicates higher amounts neural variability as a typical feature of social development in infancy, and a necessary component of neural development (2). The results also corroborated the findings in a 2021 paper that infant sadness was the earliest behavioral predictor of ADHD at 3 months of age (5). Overall this work can help provide insight into the infant's developing brain and identify signatures reflective of different developmental trajectories.
Disorders of the Nervous System:
Neurodevelopmental/ Early Life (eg. ADHD, autism) 1
Lifespan Development:
Early life, Adolescence, Aging
Modeling and Analysis Methods:
EEG/MEG Modeling and Analysis
Novel Imaging Acquisition Methods:
EEG 2
Keywords:
Attention Deficit Disorder
Development
Electroencephaolography (EEG)
Pediatric Disorders
1|2Indicates the priority used for review
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