(PS4-A16) Cardiovascular Correlates of Adolescents’ Anhedonic Symptoms During Rewarding Parent-child Interaction

Background: Anhedonia, characterized by atypically low pleasure and motivation, predicts major depression and treatment resistance (Pine et al., 1999; Pelizza & Ferrari, 2009). It tends to emerge in adolescence, when emotion dysregulation increases (Beesdo et al. 2010; Kovacs et al. 2019). Learning the potential autonomic physiological correlates of anhedonia in young adolescents could help inform early interventions. We examined the relationship between anhedonia and a motivation-relevant sympathetic index, cardiovascular pre-ejection period (PEP), in clinically-referred young adolescents. PEP reflects the contractility of the heart muscle and is particularly useful in examining our body’s effort mobilization, including to reward. We predicted increased anhedonic symptom severity will be characterized by an overall lengthening of the PEP value in the context of rewarding parent-child interaction.

Methods: Complete data on 141 adolescents (M_age = 12.03 years; female = 47%; racial/ethnic minority = 60%) were drawn from a large, multi-wave, multimethod study of emotional development. Anhedonia was estimated using a composite of relevant, child-reported items from clinical interviews, questionnaires, and ecological momentary assessment; reliability was adequate (α = .61; Hajjar, 2018). Adolescent PEP values were captured using impedance cardiography during a resting baseline and a positive parent-child interaction task in which the dyad made plans for a fun activity they wanted to do together. We conducted a hierarchical regression predicting adolescent’s PEP during the fun activity discussion using the anhedonia composite in Step 1, and we entered theoretically (adolescent’s subjective happiness during the task; observed positive affect in the dyad; adolescent anxiety symptom severity) sample-relevant and methodological covariates (child age, BMI, and baseline PEP) in subsequent steps as a robustness test.

Data Analytic Plan/

Results: Consistent with hypotheses, in Step 1 anhedonia symptoms were associated with higher PEP values (t = 2.19, p = .031). In Step 2, this relationship remained significant when controlling for adolescent’s subjective happiness during the task; observed positive affect in the dyad (t = 2.15, p = .034). In Step 3, we added adolescent self-reported anxiety (Youth Self Report; Achenbach, 1999), and anhedonia dropped to marginally significant (t = 1.86, p = .066). In Step 4, we added all other remaining covariates and found that anhedonia dropped to nonsignificant (t = 1.34, p = .183), likely because anhedonia was also related to lengthened PEP during the baseline, and not just in the context of rewarding interaction.

Implications: Findings are consistent with emerging studies suggesting blunted PEP reactivity may be a marker for anhedonia in adolescents (e.g., Ahles et al., 2017). If we can determine potential indicators of anhedonia, and the role anhedonia plays in disrupted reward-processing, we may be able to develop targeted interventions to minimize these negative impacts.

Keywords: anhedonia, pre-ejection period (PEP), adolescents, rewarding interaction