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About this paper symposium
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| Panel 31. Solicited Content: Integrative Developmental Science |
| Paper #1 | |||
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| Co-creating programmatic developmental neuroscience research with communities: The impact of ethnic-racial discrimination on child anxiety | |||
| Author information | Role | ||
| Kalina J. Michalska, Ph.D., University of California, Riverside, United States | Presenting author | ||
| Jordan L. Mullins, University of California, Riverside, United States | Non-presenting author | ||
| Abstract | |||
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Background: Although influential neurodevelopmental work has addressed effects of trauma and other forms of adversity on the neurobiology of threat learning and anxiety in youth, effects of stressful experiences specific to ethnically and racially marginalized groups have received scant consideration in extant research. Our lab is beginning to address this gap with a longitudinal study of effects of ethnic-racial discrimination in 10–13-year-old Mexican-heritage Latina girls, a historically understudied population that encounters unique and compounding cultural stressors like sexism, racism, and economic marginalization. We plan to use computational fMRI techniques to examine the effects of cumulative stress exposure on neurodevelopment due to ethnic-racial discrimination. This presentation highlights two foundational components of our research program: (1) the creation of a Community Advisory Board (CAB) to formalize researcher-community partnerships by placing the concerns of the community on our agenda and (2) initial evidence documenting links between parental experiences of ethnic-racial discrimination, children’s anxiety symptoms, and brain structure. Together, these components set the stage for characterizing longitudinal associations with functional threat neurocircuitry and child anxiety symptoms. Methods: Primary caregivers of 161 predominantly Mexican-heritage Latina girls (Mage = 10.70, SD = 1.68) reported their exposure to racism, acculturative stress, and political hostility via well-validated measures including the Perceived Discrimination Scale, the Everyday Discrimination Scale, and the Experiences of Discrimination Scale, assessing the frequency and appraisal of discriminatory events. Caregivers also reported their own and their daughter’s anxiety severity. To index cultural stress, a principal component was extracted from composite scores of the racism, acculturative stress, and political hostility questionnaires. Hierarchical regression analyses then tested whether the multidetermined cultural stress component predicted caregiver and child anxiety. A second preliminary study in 30 Mexican-heritage girls evaluated whether amygdala volume mediated associations between ethnic–racial discrimination exposure and anxiety symptoms. Results: Cultural stress positively predicted caregiver (ΔR2 = .13, p < .001) and child (ΔR2 = .15, p < .001) anxiety symptoms over and above the observed inverse effects of subjective socioeconomic status, such that higher levels of cultural stress were associated with elevated levels of caregiver (ß = .37, p < .001) and child (ß = .39, p < .001) anxiety symptoms in Study 1 and an indirect effect of ethnic–racial discrimination on anxiety symptoms via left amygdala volume was observed in Study 2, β = −0.28, SE = 0.17, BC 95% CI [−0.690, −0.017]. Discussion: Community-based participatory research includes community members in the scientific co-creation at multiple steps in the research process. However, they are rarely, if ever, used in neuroscience research. Fostering a full partnership between the research team and the community under study ensures that researchers gain an understanding of the context in which community members assess the risks and benefits of research. I will discuss insights gleaned from three meetings and share how community members can act as key collaborators who can help inform research protocols, provide us with real life examples of issues under study, voice the concerns of the community, assist in developing community education resources and help disseminate scientific findings. |
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| Paper #2 | |
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| Examining digital social influence among adolescents: a mixed-methods approach combining neuroimaging and participatory research practices | |
| Author information | Role |
| Maria Maza, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, United States | Presenting author |
| Adolescent Researchers, Various High Schools in Durham, NC, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Andrea Baldelli, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Alexandra Lightfoot, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Eva H. Telzer, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Abstract | |
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Social influence, the process through which individuals learn and internalize peer norms, is well studied among adolescents as it can facilitate important developmental processes (Molleman et al., 2022). As social media increasingly becomes one of adolescents’ primary means of social communication (Nesi et al., 2018), it is crucial to study how its unique affordances (i.e., quantifiability and accessibility) may alter the ways in which adolescents experience and respond to digital social influences. However, social influences online can be complex and highly personalized and thus are challenging to study. In this talk, I will highlight two projects which merge participatory research and neuroimaging methodologies to generate a more comprehensive understanding of digital social influences among adolescents. The first study used a participatory research approach and to examine adolescents’ lived experiences of digital social influence and the impact of these on their psychological adjustment through photography. Adolescents (N = 34; girls = 58%; age range:14-16) drawn from a local education nonprofit organization in North Carolina participated in 5 photovoice sessions. Thematic analyses of the photo discussion sessions showed the nuance and complexity of adolescents’ experiences of digital social influence. Adolescents reported experiencing digital social influence from various sources (i.e., peers, parents, influencers) which had both positive and negative impacts on their health. Adolescents brought up individual factors (i.e., self-esteem and hobbies) which may lead to differences in how people perceive and respond to influences online. Finally, adolescents provided recommendations to improve youths’ experiences on digital platforms at the individual, community, and societal levels. In the second study, we co-created a novel fMRI task with a youth advisory board to explore the behavioral and neural correlates of digital social influence. Adolescent participants (N = 49; Mage = 16.96, SDage = 0.54, boys = 49.0%, girls = 46.9%, nonbinary = 4.1%, Black = 32.7%, Latinx = 32.7%, White = 30.6%, Multiracial = 4.1%) were asked to rate images of their peers daily for two weeks in a mock social media platform. Subsequently adolescents completed the fMRI Digital Peer Influence Task in which youth were shown peers’ ratings of these images which were either the same as their own (i.e., noninfluence trials) or different than their own (i.e., influence trials), and were asked to re-rate these images. A multilevel model showed that within participants social influence scores were significantly lower in noninfluence trials compared to influence trials (ß = -0.08; p < 0.000). A whole brain analysis showed greater activation in the left inferior frontal gyrus (lIFG; x, y, z = -58, 16, -2) and right inferior frontal gyrus (rIFG; x, y, z = 46, 24, -16) during influence trials compared to non-influence trials. Findings indicate that adolescents change their behaviors in response to digital social influence about 65% of the time and highlight the role of salience detection and response inhibition regions in processing digital social influence. Together, these studies demonstrate the value of integrating youth participation with developmental neuroscience to better understand adolescent development in digital contexts. |
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| Paper #3 | |
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| The CARE Project: A Community-Driven Study of Environmental Effects on Health and Wellbeing across Development | |
| Author information | Role |
| Dr. Arianna Gard, Ph.D., University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Presenting author |
| Joelle Fuchs, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Deena Shariq, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Taylor Wilds, The University of Texas at Austin, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Sriparna Sen, University of Pittsburgh, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Sophia M. Shaw, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Stephanie Aybar Bueno, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Ximena Diaz Juarez, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Isabella Gonzalez, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Saron Melaku, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Prutha Patel, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Giselle Maya, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Jalan Walker, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Jason Clarke, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Emily Yang, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Andy Hindenach, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Luna Warren, University of Maryland, College Park, United States | Non-presenting author |
| Abstract | |
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Community-based participatory research (CBPR), which includes community members as partners in the research process, is relatively new in the developmental sciences and has scarcely been integrated into studies of the developing brain. As other fields have shown (e.g., public health), CBPR engages participants underrepresented in science, promotes civic engagement, and fosters community-led solutions to society’s most pressing challenges (e.g., environmental racism; Ravichandran et al., 2024). And yet, in a field built on a foundation of investigator-driven inquiry, hypothesis testing, and psychological distance from the populations under study, the extent to which CBPR can be integrated alongside a developmental neuroscience study is yet unknown. This paper will present the design and results from the Community And Resilient Environments (CARE) Project, a community-driven multiphase study of environmental effects on health and wellbeing in Washington, DC. CARE was initiated in 2021 as a sequential exploratory mixed methods project built on the principles of CBPR (Figure 1). The project began by developing community partnerships and conducting qualitative interviews with DC residents. Results led to the design and administration of a population-based household survey, a youth research internship program, community advisory boards, and continued outreach efforts (Figure 1). The CARE project is now working with adult and youth community advisory boards to develop a strengths-based study of teen neurodevelopment. Table 1 summarizes key results from each phase of project. Initial efforts (Phases I – III) revealed both the research topics that were of interest to community members as well as the resource needs that our team could plausibly address. Caregivers, adolescents, and community leaders were concerned about the impacts of neighborhood social disintegration on positive youth development; transience and community violence were noted as key contributors. Positive health and wellbeing were conceptualized from a multisystem perspective; community definitions focused on skills and capacities rather than the absence of pathology. It also became clear that community members were interested in scientific research and the developing brain, but wanted to know that participating would impact their everyday lives. The CARE Project is currently developing a study of teen neurodevelopment with community members (Phase IV). In a year-long study of focus groups and protocol testing, advisory board members are evaluating the scientific merit and community impact of a study that examines how exposure to threat-related environmental adversity shapes the pace of cognitive and affective skill development during adolescence. Data from the first four focus groups indicates community endorsement of a strengths-based framework of skill development, with clear preferences in the language used to describe developmental adaptation. By May 2025, all advisory board members will have piloted and edited the proposed study protocol, and each component of the protocol (including neuroimaging) will have been approved or removed by the advisory boards. In addition to reporting the results of this effort, we will describe the initiatives set in place by the researcher-community team to increase the impact of the CARE Project beyond scientific discovery. |
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Recent Advances in Community-Engaged Developmental Neuroscience: Three Stories of Process and Outcomes
Submission Type
Paper Symposium
Description
| Session Title | Recent Advances in Community-Engaged Developmental Neuroscience: Three Stories of Process and Outcomes |