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<td><span style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:20px;font-weight:bold;">PsyPost – Psychology News</span></td>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/an-unpredictable-childhood-predicts-greater-psychological-distress-during-the-israel-hamas-war/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">An unpredictable childhood predicts greater psychological distress during the Israel-Hamas war</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">Apr 8th 2026, 10:00</div>
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<p><p>A study conducted in Israel during the 2023 war with Hamas found that individuals reporting greater early-life unpredictability tended to experience a greater increase in psychological distress during the war. They also tended to have greater psychological distress and emotion dysregulation before the war started. The paper was published in the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2026.121249"><em>Journal of Affective Disorders</em></a>.</p>
<p>Early-life unpredictability is the degree to which a child’s environment is unstable, inconsistent, or difficult to predict over time. It includes experiences such as frequent changes in caregivers, household chaos, inconsistent routines, or sudden shifts in resources and safety. Unlike simple deprivation, unpredictability is about variability rather than just a lack of input or support.</p>
<p>Research in developmental psychology shows that children are highly sensitive not only to what they receive but also to how stable those conditions are. High unpredictability can shape cognitive and emotional development, especially systems related to learning, stress, and decision-making. For example, children in unpredictable environments may become more vigilant and reactive to potential threats. They may also prioritize short-term rewards over long-term planning, which can be adaptive in unstable contexts.</p>
<p>Study author Ohad Szepsenwol and his colleagues note that life history theory interprets the changes in cognition and emotional responses driven by unpredictability as strategic responses to environmental conditions, creating what is called a “fast” life history strategy. This is a strategy that prioritizes rapid growth, early reproduction, and the production of more offspring through increased mating effort, but heavily discounts long-term outcomes, as the future is unpredictable. They conducted a study in which they followed Israeli adults for over six years, looking into emotion dysregulation and psychological distress before and during the Israel-Hamas war.</p>
<p>Study participants were 720 Israeli Jews who joined a longitudinal study in January 2018 and completed subsequent assessments in April 2022, December 2023, and March 2024. They were between 18 and 64 years of age at the start of the study, with the average age being 43. On average, they had 1.75 children, and nearly 53% of the participants were men.</p>
<p>Study participants completed assessments of psychological distress (the SCL-10R), emotion dysregulation (the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale – 18), and early-life unpredictability. The assessment of early-life unpredictability consisted of six questions asking about three types of unpredictability experienced during the first 10 years of life: changes in economic circumstances, moving to a different environment, and changes inside the family. </p>
<p>In the 2023 and 2024 assessments, participants also answered four items assessing direct exposure to the Israel-Hamas war in the prior three months. They answered how frequently they experienced sirens and alerts, heard explosions, felt their lives were in danger, and felt family members’ lives were in danger.</p>
<p>Results showed that more pronounced early-life unpredictability was associated with greater psychological distress and emotion dysregulation before the war. Both of these characteristics increased significantly across the board after the war started. However, the spike in psychological distress after the start of the war was much stronger in individuals who experienced higher early-life unpredictability. </p>
<p>Interestingly, the increase in emotion dysregulation during the war was not dependent on early-life unpredictability; participants’ ability to regulate their emotions worsened at roughly the same rate regardless of their childhood environment. Furthermore, among individuals directly exposed to the war, early-life unpredictability was associated with a substantially greater increase in psychological distress.</p>
<p>“These findings indicate that the Israel-Hamas war exerted an emotional and psychological toll on Israeli adults. They further suggest that early-life unpredictability is a general risk factor for emotion dysregulation and psychological distress in adulthood and predicts worse mental health in war-exposed individuals,” the study authors concluded.</p>
<p>The study contributes to the scientific understanding of the links between childhood unpredictability and psychological characteristics later in life. However, it should be noted that the assessment of early childhood unpredictability was based on the retrospective recall of childhood experiences provided by adult participants, leaving room for recall bias to affect the results. Additionally, the researchers noted that their sample focused exclusively on Israeli Jews, highlighting a need for similar research among Arab citizens of Israel and Palestinians in Gaza, who have also been profoundly affected by the conflict. Finally, the design of the study does not allow strict causal inferences to be derived from the findings.</p>
<p>The paper, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2026.121249">Associations between early-life unpredictability and mental health during the Israel-Hamas war,</a>” was authored by Ohad Szepsenwol, Dvora Shmulewitz, Vera Svirksky, and Mario Mikulincer.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/toddlers-are-happier-giving-treats-to-others-than-receiving-them-study-finds/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Toddlers are happier giving treats to others than receiving them, study finds</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">Apr 8th 2026, 08:00</div>
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<p><p>A new study published in <em><a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/desc.70171" target="_blank">Developmental Science</a></em> suggests that the act of giving to others is intrinsically rewarding for humans, even at a very young age. Scientists found that toddlers express more happiness when sharing treats with someone else than when receiving treats themselves. This provides evidence that human cooperation is driven by a natural emotional reward from prosocial behavior, which refers to actions intended to benefit others.</p>
<p>Across many different cultures, people routinely share their resources with friends and strangers. These generous acts often come at a personal cost, ranging from giving food to a neighbor to donating an organ. Scientists wanted to understand what motivates this type of deep cooperation.</p>
<p>“Human beings are remarkably (pro)social, and some individuals are willing to share resources even at significant personal cost (as seen in surrogate pregnancy and organ donation). We are therefore very interested in exploring the developmental origins and motivational forces behind these generous sharing behaviors,” said study author <a href="https://endatan.github.io/" target="_blank">Enda Tan</a>, an assistant professor at the University of Victoria.</p>
<p>Previous research suggests that helping others creates a positive feedback loop of happiness, a concept psychologists often call a “warm glow.” This positive emotional response encourages future acts of generosity. However, past studies on young children often relied on very small sample sizes.</p>
<p>The small size of previous study groups made it difficult to precisely estimate how much happiness giving actually produced. In addition, previous experiments left open an alternative explanation for the children’s positive reactions. It was possible that toddlers were not smiling because they enjoyed sharing, but simply because they liked following the instructions of a friendly adult.</p>
<p>Young children are highly attentive to social rules and generally want to please the adults around them. The researchers designed the current experiment to test these possibilities directly. They aimed to see if toddlers truly enjoy the act of giving, or if they just enjoy doing what they are told.</p>
<p>The team recruited 134 healthy toddlers, ranging in age from exactly 16.57 to 23.77 months. During the experiment, the children sat on their caregiver’s lap across a table from a scientist. To prevent caregivers from influencing the toddlers, the adults wore headphones with music and kept their eyes closed.</p>
<p>The experimenters then introduced the children to a stuffed monkey puppet. They explained that the monkey liked to eat treats, such as graham crackers or Goldfish crackers. The main part of the experiment involved a series of structured interactions centered around these snacks.</p>
<p>First, the scientist gave the toddler eight treats, which allowed the child to experience receiving an appealing reward. Then, the toddler participated in four different scenarios in a randomized order. In the “costly giving” scenario, the child was asked to give one of their own treats to the monkey.</p>
<p>In the “non-costly giving” scenario, the scientist provided a new treat from a hidden bowl and asked the child to give it to the monkey. The study also included two additional scenarios to serve as comparisons. During the “observe giving” phase, the scientist gave a treat to the monkey while the child simply watched.</p>
<p>Finally, in the “give to self” phase, the scientist provided a treat and asked the child to keep it. This last scenario was designed to test whether toddlers were simply happy to follow an adult’s instructions, even when the action was not generous. The monkey puppet reacted with the same enthusiasm every time it received a snack.</p>
<p>To measure the children’s emotional responses, the researchers recorded video of the toddlers’ faces during each phase. Independent reviewers, who did not know the purpose of the study, watched the videos and rated the children’s happiness on a seven-point scale. A score of one represented a lack of happiness, while a score of seven indicated a very happy response, such as laughing.</p>
<p>The scientists also rated the monkey puppet’s apparent enthusiasm. This helped them check for emotional contagion, which is a psychological phenomenon where a person simply “catches” or mimics the emotions of someone around them. They wanted to ensure the child was not just reflecting the puppet’s joy.</p>
<p>The findings indicate that toddlers experience a measurable boost in mood when engaging in generous behavior. The children displayed significantly more happiness after giving a treat to the monkey than they did after receiving their own bowl of treats. This positive emotional response occurred whether the toddlers gave away their own treats or handed over a treat provided by the scientist.</p>
<p>The data also helps rule out the idea that the toddlers were just enjoying the process of following instructions. The children were consistently happier when instructed to give a treat to the monkey than when instructed to give a treat to themselves. Giving a treat to themselves produced no more happiness than receiving treats at the beginning of the game.</p>
<p>The researchers also found that taking an active role in sharing tends to be more rewarding than watching someone else be generous. The toddlers showed greater happiness when they personally handed a non-costly treat to the puppet compared to when they merely observed the scientist feeding the monkey. When combining both forms of giving, the children were significantly happier acting generously than simply watching.</p>
<p>Finally, the researchers noted that the toddlers’ joy did not simply mirror the puppet’s happy reactions. The statistical analysis showed that variations in the puppet’s displayed enthusiasm did not predict how happy the children were. This suggests the happiness was a direct result of performing a kind action, rather than emotional contagion.</p>
<p>“This study provides evidence that, soon after sharing behaviors emerge, young children experience greater reward from giving resources to others than from receiving resources, observing others give, or giving to themselves,” Tan told PsyPost. “This suggests that sharing is intrinsically rewarding early in development, which may create a positive feedback loop reinforcing future generosity.”</p>
<p>While these findings provide evidence for an early emotional reward tied to sharing, there are some limitations to consider. The study relied on a specific sample of families from a North American city. Future research could recruit more diverse groups of children from different cultural backgrounds to see if this emotional reward is universal.</p>
<p>The scientists also suggest using biological measurements in future studies to evaluate emotions. Tools that measure changes in pupil size or skin conductance could track happiness more objectively than coding facial expressions.</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/desc.70171" target="_blank">Toddlers Are Happier Giving to Others Than to Themselves</a>,” was authored by Enda Tan, Julia Van de Vondervoort, Jeneesha Dhaliwal, Lara B. Aknin, and Jane Kiley Hamlin.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/you-might-understand-music-theory-better-than-you-think-regardless-of-formal-training/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Your brain might understand music theory better than you think, regardless of formal training</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">Apr 8th 2026, 06:00</div>
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<p><p>A recent study published in <em><a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/09567976251400331" target="_blank">Psychological Science</a></em> provides evidence that people naturally absorb the underlying rules of music just by listening to it over their lifetime. The findings suggest that both trained musicians and people with no musical background use harmonic context in remarkably similar ways to predict and remember musical patterns.</p>
<p>Scholars have long debated whether formal training is required to understand the deeper harmonic frameworks of music. Music is organized into layers of notes, phrases, and sections, similar to how language is structured into words and sentences. Some experts believe that understanding this organization requires explicit instruction in music theory.</p>
<p>Other scientists argue that mere passive exposure to music allows the brain to implicitly learn these rules. Previous studies have yielded mixed results regarding how formal training impacts a listener’s ability to process tonal context. Tonal context refers to the overarching harmonic organization or key of a piece of music.</p>
<p>“There has been quite a bit of work looking at how listeners build up musical context, but the open question was how much context is actually used,” said corresponding author Riesa Y. Cassano-Coleman, a PhD candidate at the University of Rochester and member of <a href="https://www.piazzalab.com/" target="_blank">the SoNIC (“Science of Neural, Interpersonal Communication”) lab</a>.</p>
<p>“This study was also motivated by an analogous line of research in language/narrative: different areas of the brain respond to different amounts of coherent context in narratives (Lerner et al., 2011 J. Neurosci.). Basically everyone is an “expert” in narratives (at least in the sense that people use language and stories to communicate in everyday life) but not everyone is an expert in music. So music provides an interesting test case: do we need formal training in music to understand musical structure?”</p>
<p>To resolve this debate, the researchers designed a systematic way to test listeners. They wanted to see how the amount of coherent musical information affects a person’s ability to encode, predict, and segment music. By scrambling musical pieces at different time intervals, the scientists manipulated the amount of musical context available to the listener.</p>
<p>The researchers conducted four separate experiments using piano pieces from Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Album for the Young. They created different versions of the music by scrambling the pieces at various timescales. The conditions included one-bar scrambles, two-bar scrambles, eight-bar scrambles, and completely intact music.</p>
<p>A musical bar, or measure, is a small segment of time containing a specific number of beats. By keeping features like volume, instrument type, and speed constant, the scientists ensured that participants were reacting only to changes in the harmonic structure.</p>
<p>“On the surface, our different musical stimuli sound pretty uniform: same piano timbre, same tempo, no change in dynamics (volume),” Cassano-Coleman explained. “So the only thing that changes across conditions is the underlying structure. What we wanted to test is to what extent listeners used that structure, specifically to remember and predict in the music.”</p>
<p>In the first experiment, the researchers tested musical memory. They recruited 108 adults between the ages of 19 and 41, splitting them evenly into musicians with at least five years of training and nonmusicians with no training.</p>
<p>Participants listened to a sixteen-second prompt from one of the scrambled conditions. After a brief delay, they had one and a half seconds to identify which of two short musical clips had appeared in the prompt. The results showed that memory improved for both groups as the music became less scrambled.</p>
<p>Musicians performed better overall on the memory task, but both groups benefited from longer stretches of intact music at the exact same rate. Even within the musician group, having more years of practice did not predict better memory performance. This suggests a shared underlying mechanism for memory encoding.</p>
<p>The second experiment tested musical prediction using a distinct sample of 108 adults, again divided evenly between musicians and nonmusicians. Participants listened to fourteen-second prompts and then chose which of two short clips best completed the musical sequence. The data revealed that prediction accuracy increased as the amount of intact musical context increased.</p>
<p>In this prediction task, musicians did not perform better than nonmusicians. Both groups utilized the available harmonic information equally well to guess the upcoming notes. This provides evidence that people unconsciously apply the rules of music theory to anticipate what comes next, regardless of their formal education.</p>
<p>In the third experiment, the scientists explored event segmentation, which is how people mentally divide continuous sounds into meaningful chunks. A sample of 95 adults listened to longer, one-minute musical pieces. They were instructed to press the spacebar on their keyboard whenever they heard a meaningful change in the music.</p>
<p>“The event segmentation task requires context integration in real time: in order to segment the music into meaningful events, as you’re listening, you have to remember what you just heard, predict what’s coming next, and decide if it’s enough of a meaningful change to mark an event boundary,” Cassano-Coleman told PsyPost. “This gives us some insight into how these processes unfold under more natural listening conditions over tens of seconds or minutes, rather than just the 15 or so seconds in the memory and prediction tasks.”</p>
<p>As the music became more heavily scrambled, all participants pressed the button more frequently. Their responses naturally aligned with the new boundaries created by the scrambling process. When the music was left intact, both groups successfully identified standard eight-bar phrases as meaningful events.</p>
<p>A difference between the groups emerged when looking at longer musical structures. Musicians tended to align their button presses with sixteen-bar hyperphrases, which are larger musical sections made up of multiple smaller phrases. Nonmusicians tended to stick to identifying the shorter eight-bar phrases.</p>
<p>The researchers conducted additional checks to ensure that simple changes in pitch height or rhythmic speed were not guiding these responses. This provides evidence that listeners were genuinely tracking the underlying harmonic rules.</p>
<p>The fourth experiment tested explicit awareness of the structural disruptions. The researchers asked 108 participants from the first two experiments to listen to the one-minute pieces and explicitly identify the level of scrambling. Participants had to choose whether the music was scrambled every bar, every two bars, every eight bars, or left intact.</p>
<p>Musicians performed better on this categorization task than nonmusicians. This suggests that explicit theory training helps people consciously reason about musical structure. Yet both groups struggled most with identifying the completely intact music and the highly chaotic one-bar scrambles, achieving their highest accuracy on the midlevel scrambles.</p>
<p>“What we found is that listeners do integrate musical context over time, and that you don’t need formal training to make use of it,” Cassano-Coleman summarized. “In other words, disrupting structure (via scrambling) disrupted listeners’ ability to remember and accurately predict what comes next. The biggest thing that surprised us was just how similarly musicians and non-musicians perform in these tasks – musicians did seem to have an advantage in explicit labeling (experiment 4), but otherwise both groups performed better (at similar rates) with more intact context.”</p>
<p>While this study offers a detailed look at music cognition, it does have a few limitations. The researchers utilized pieces from Western classical music, which follows a very specific set of harmonic rules. It remains unclear if listeners would show the exact same patterns of context integration when listening to diverse genres or music from other cultures.</p>
<p>Future research could explore how different musical features, such as changing rhythms or different combinations of instruments, drive event segmentation. Scientists also plan to investigate how highly trained musicians use this type of context while actively performing. Combining behavioral tests with brain imaging could help pinpoint exactly how the mind merges multiple streams of auditory information.</p>
<p>“In terms of future directions, we’re interested in what’s happening in the brain as people listen to or as expert pianists play these scrambled stimuli in the fMRI scanner,” Cassano-Coleman said. “Stay tuned for that!”</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/09567976251400331" target="_blank">Listeners Systematically Integrate Hierarchical Tonal Context, Regardless of Musical Training</a>,” was authored by Riesa Y. Cassano-Coleman, Sarah C. Izen, and Elise A. Piazza.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/can-psychopaths-change-new-research-suggests-tailored-treatments-might-work/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Can psychopaths change? New research suggests tailored treatments might work</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">Apr 7th 2026, 18:00</div>
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<p><p>Psychopaths might account for only about 1% of the general population, but they account for a disproportionate share of violent crime.</p>
<p>Distinct from other conditions like sociopathy and antisocial personality disorder, psychopaths tend to show traits such as an absence of remorse or guilt, a lack of empathy and a charming and manipulative interpersonal style.</p>
<p>You may find it hard to imagine how someone without much empathy can change. And early psychological treatments were not successful. But advances in research are showing that a deeper understanding of psychopathy may help to create more effective interventions.</p>
<p>People with psychopathy typically show problems in responding to other people’s suffering, including difficulty recognising facial expressions of fear and sadness. If you have ever seen someone badly hurt themselves, then you probably had an averse response.</p>
<p>Your brain will have reacted to their pain and your body will probably have shown signs of physiological arousal. Your heart rate might have gone up, or you might have sweated.</p>
<p>These are common signs of physiological arousal in response to someone else’s suffering. But they are <a href="https://royalsocietypublishing.org/rstb/article/373/1744/20170155/23415/Traits-of-empathy-and-anger-implications-for">often lacking</a> in psychopaths.</p>
<p>When my colleagues and I asked people in prison with a history of violence to view pictures of others’ emotional facial expressions, those who reported more of the characteristic features of psychopathy also <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/buy/2019-39485-001">showed blunted physiological arousal</a>. Our 2019 study found that the pupil (the small black hole in the centre of the eye that lets in light but also increases in size during physiological arousal) did not change much in size among people higher in psychopathic traits when they looked at pictures of people who were afraid.</p>
<p>These differences mean that some people with these traits might struggle to learn about how their actions cause other people to feel distressed or afraid.</p>
<p>Prisons and secure forensic hospitals are where people with psychopathic traits are often entered into treatment programmes designed to reduce their risk of reoffending. <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2025-37785-001">Modest reductions in general reoffending</a> have been reported following cognitive behavioural programmes that are offered to people in prison with or without psychopathy or another personality disorder.</p>
<p>But not all criminal behaviour programs have been marked by success. For<br>
example, in the UK in 2017 the failure of the <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/623876/sotp-report-web-.pdf">Core Sexual Offender Treatment Programme</a> designed by His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) and approved for use in 1992, to lower reoffending was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/30/sex-offenders-on-group-treatment-programme-more-likely-to-reoffend">highly publicised</a>.</p>
<p>HMPPS has since introduced a new programme, <a href="https://insidetime.org/information/building-choices-2/">Building Choices</a>. It adopts a strengths-based, skill focused approach to improve emotion management, healthy relationships and sense of purpose. Unlike the previous course, the programme is not designed to address particular offence types, and it has <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/68763e2f88da2e5804bb6a51/next-generation-behaviour-report.pdf">shown some signs of promise</a>.</p>
<p>Historically, researchers <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272735801000836">have considered</a> such programmes less effective at reducing reoffending when offered to people with psychopathy. Indeed, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/chapter/edited-volume/pii/B9780128114193000017">some studies</a> even suggest that people with psychopathy worsened following treatment.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Grant-Harris-4/publication/230601549_Psychopaths_Is_a_therapeutic_community_therapeutic/links/00b7d5228b6abb9615000000/Psychopaths-Is-a-therapeutic-community-therapeutic.pdf">One of these programmes</a>, offered from around 1965 to 1978 at the maximum-security Oak Ridge Division of the Mental Health Centre in Penetanguishene, Ontario, Canada, made use of a so called “total encounter capsule.”</p>
<p>These results made for a high degree of pessimism among scientists and practitioners alike. But that pessimism might be misplaced.</p>
<p>It is perhaps unsurprising that the “total encounter capsule” did not prove effective. The capsule was “a tiny self-contained chamber where sustenance was supplied through tubes in the walls and from which no group members would leave during sessions that lasted up to two weeks”.</p>
<p>Participants were reported to be nude and did not participate voluntarily. There were few professional therapists, and the use of force and humiliation was permitted.</p>
<p>Historically, there has been <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(14)61394-5/fulltext">a lot of pessimism</a> around treatment for other personality disorders, too.</p>
<p>This is in part a reflection of stigma attached to these disorders. But it is also because personality difficulties can make it harder for people to build relationships, <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11920-022-01379-4">including with</a> the people responsible for their treatment.</p>
<p>Yet a form of therapy known as <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27015720/">dialectical behaviour therapy</a> has shown success in reducing self-harm in people with borderline personality disorder (which is not associated with criminality). This type of therapy is designed to help people <a href="https://www.awp.nhs.uk/patients-and-carers/leaflets-and-resources/patient-and-carer-information-leaflets/conditions-and-treatments/dialectical-behaviour-therapy-dbt">cope with intense emotions</a> and to learn interpersonal skills.</p>
<p>In another recent study, <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0366(24)00445-0/abstract">mentalisation-based treatment</a>, which targets the person’s ability to understand and regulate the negative effects of thoughts and feelings, led to reductions in aggressive behaviour in people with antisocial personality disorder. Findings like these suggest tailored interventions are more effective when it comes to personality disorders.</p>
<h2>Capable of empathy?</h2>
<p>One important consideration when <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272735822000307">treating psychopaths</a> is that they are often assumed to be incapable of empathy. But this assumption has been challenged by some intriguing studies, which suggests that they might instead lack the motivation for empathy.</p>
<p>In a <a href="https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/136/8/2550/432196">2013 brain scanning study</a>, a group of scientists at the university of Groningen, the Netherlands, showed that although criminal psychopaths did not automatically feel empathy for other people’s pain depicted in videos, their brains did generate an empathic response similar to that of non-psychopaths when instructed to feel what the people in the videos were feeling.</p>
<p>It could be an important step toward helping people with psychopathy if they could better understand how their actions can hurt other people.</p>
<p>Perhaps the most promising work that suggests people with psychopathy can<br>
change has been conducted with young people. Although children and young people under the age of 18 cannot be diagnosed as psychopathic, features of psychopathy referred to as callous unemotional traits can be reliably assessed in children as young as <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10802-015-0075-y">two years of age</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15374416.2018.1479966">A 2018 study</a> adapted parenting interventions to be more effective for this high-risk group of children, aged three to six years old. Afterwards, the children showed significant reductions in behavioural problems, callous unemotional traits and aggression. The researchers coached parents to show more warmth, sensitivity and responsiveness. Parents were also asked to focus on reward-based rather than punishment-based strategies to encourage the child participants to be more responsive to distress in others.</p>
<p><a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10826-022-02435-6">A 2022 study</a> also reported positive outcomes, showing improvements in behaviour and personal relationships in adolescents after an intervention with a focus on strength-based (helping children understand what they’re good at) rather than punishment-based parenting strategies.</p>
<p>So recent work is offering a glimpse of a more optimistic future for reducing aggressive and antisocial behaviour associated with psychopathy. Perhaps the question is not can psychopaths change now, but can we get better at helping them to change.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-psychopaths-change-270344">original article</a>.</em></p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/maternal-exposure-to-short-chain-pfas-causes-persistent-memory-problems-in-adult-2026-03-19/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Maternal exposure to short-chain PFAS causes persistent memory problems in adult rats</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">Apr 7th 2026, 16:00</div>
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<p><p>Exposure to supposedly safer alternatives to traditional forever chemicals during pregnancy and nursing causes lasting memory and learning problems in adult rats. The animal research suggests that early contact with these synthetic compounds interferes with normal brain development. The study was published in <em><a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/ftox.2025.1702330">Frontiers in Toxicology</a></em>.</p>
<p>Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, universally known as PFAS, are highly stable synthetic chemicals characterized by extremely strong carbon-fluorine bonds. Manufacturers have used them since the 1940s to make products resist heat, oil, and water. These functional properties make them highly useful in nonstick cookware, food packaging, and waterproof clothing.</p>
<p>Because they break down very slowly, they accumulate in the environment and inside the human body. Older versions of these chemicals are typically composed of molecular chains featuring eight or more carbon atoms. Epidemiological studies have repeatedly linked prenatal exposure to these long-chain PFAS with adverse developmental outcomes, altering cognition and behavior in children.</p>
<p>In response to health and environmental concerns, manufacturers largely phased out these long-chain variants. They replaced them with short-chain varieties, which contain fewer carbon atoms and are purportedly eliminated from the human body more quickly. Two common chemical replacements in this category are GenX and perfluorobutanoic acid, widely known as PFBA.</p>
<p>Despite the widespread adoption of short-chain PFAS, experimental data regarding their safety during fetal and early life stages remains highly limited. Researchers from the University of Bologna and the Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale delle Venezie designed an animal experiment to test whether early exposure to GenX and PFBA affects the mammalian brain. Lead researchers Luca Lorenzini and Marzia Moretti sought to understand how exposure during pregnancy and nursing might alter brain architecture and cognitive function well into adulthood.</p>
<p>The researchers fed female rats a diet contaminated with either GenX or PFBA for thirty days before mating. The synthetic chemicals remained in the animals’ food supply throughout pregnancy and until their newborn pups were weaned. The doses were designed to fall beneath the threshold where acute physical toxicity is normally observed, mirroring the low but persistent exposure levels sometimes found in human water supplies.</p>
<p>After weaning, the offspring ate a standard diet free of any contamination. This design mirrors the way mammals experience placental and maternal milk transfer of chemicals. The scientists waited until the offspring reached adulthood, roughly twelve weeks after weaning, to evaluate their neurocognitive performance.</p>
<p>The researchers evaluated several behavioral domains before testing learning and memory. They placed the animals in a new, enclosed space to observe their natural movement patterns. Unexposed rats explored at a predictable pace, but rats exposed to the lowest doses of PFBA displayed unusually high levels of activity, traveling much longer distances.</p>
<p>The highest dose groups did not show this hyperactivity. This phenomenon, where low and high doses cause vastly different biological reactions, is a frequently observed feature of hormone-disrupting chemicals. The team also evaluated the animals’ motor coordination by having them walk on a rotating rod. None of the exposed groups experienced issues with basic physical balance.</p>
<p>To test learning and memory, the researchers placed the rats in a large pool of opaque water. The animals had to learn specific visual cues in the room to navigate toward a hidden submerged platform. This test evaluates spatial learning and relies heavily on a brain region called the hippocampus.</p>
<p>Rats exposed to high doses of GenX and PFBA during their early development struggled considerably with the task. They took longer to learn the location of the hidden platform than unexposed rats. When the researchers moved the platform to test cognitive flexibility, the exposed rats had great difficulty adapting to the new location.</p>
<p>These memory issues occurred despite an absence of the chemicals in the adult rat brains at the time of testing. Chemical analysis showed that GenX had completely exited the animals’ systems. While trace amounts of PFBA remained in some organs like the liver, the brain was largely clear of the chemical, ruling out the possibility of acute biological toxicity causing the memory failure.</p>
<p>Instead, the research team investigated how early exposure might have disrupted the physical construction of the developing brain. To do so, they cultured brain cells taken from fetal rats whose mothers were exposed to PFBA. The researchers observed these neurons under microscopes as they matured over three weeks in laboratory dishes.</p>
<p>When the researchers looked closely at the cultures after a week of maturation, the neurons from exposed animals appeared strangely overgrown, sprouting uncoordinated branches. By the third week, this early chaotic growth resulted in poorly developed structures. Normally, neurons generate long, specialized extensions to communicate, eventually forming connection points called synapses. The cells exposed to PFBA produced fewer connection points and expressed lower levels of proteins that are essential for stable synapse formation.</p>
<p>The team also examined the actual brains of the adult rats that underwent the behavioral testing. They specifically looked at the dentate gyrus, a section of the hippocampus responsible for generating new brain cells. In healthy adult animals, this region constantly produces and matures new neurons that help with memory formation and learning.</p>
<p>Adult rats exposed to high levels of PFBA and GenX showed clear abnormalities in this central brain area. The investigators noted an elevated presence of biological markers associated with unspecialized stem cells. At the same time, the affected rats exhibited a sharp decline in markers for maturing neurons.</p>
<p>This pattern points to a stall in the developmental process, where new cells fail to transition into fully functioning neurons. The researchers also analyzed the genetic activity within the hippocampus. They found distinct abnormalities in how the cells operated, particularly an increase in genes responsible for driving cellular inflammation.</p>
<p>Inflammation in the brain can disrupt normal cell-to-cell communication and hinder the survival of new neurons. The male rats exposed to GenX showed large elevations in multiple chemokines, which are immune signaling proteins. Female rats exposed to the chemicals also displayed similar, yet distinct, abnormal inflammatory signatures in their brain tissue.</p>
<p>The team also checked the animals’ circulating hormone levels, as hormones heavily influence brain development. The male rats exposed to high doses of either GenX or PFBA produced substantially lower levels of testosterone compared to unexposed animals. Female rats exposed to GenX experienced a similar drop in progesterone.</p>
<p>These altered hormonal states persisted for months after the exposure ended. Hormones like testosterone play a major role in keeping newly formed neurons alive in the hippocampus. The lack of these hormones might have amplified the cognitive problems observed in the affected rats.</p>
<p>While the findings clearly demonstrate the neurotoxic potential of short-chain PFAS in a rodent model, the researchers note certain limitations with their work. The team did not test hormone or chemical levels immediately after the rats finished nursing. Missing this data makes it difficult to separate the direct chemical toxicity on the infant brain from the indirect effects of maternal distress.</p>
<p>The study investigated only two short-chain PFAS variants out of thousands of similar synthetic compounds. The results achieved using GenX and PFBA might not apply to other members of the chemical family. Future experiments will need to examine varied short-chain compounds to determine if these developmental issues are a universal feature of the entire class.</p>
<p>Scaling these animal results directly to human beings also requires patience. Humans eliminate these compounds from their bodies at different rates than rodents. Evaluating how low-dose, chronic exposure affects human brain functioning will require targeted tracking of exposed populations over multiple decades.</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/ftox.2025.1702330" target="_blank">Short-chain PFAS exposure during gestation and breastfeeding alters learning and memory in adulthood: possible mechanisms related to brain development</a>,” was authored by Luca Lorenzini, Marzia Moretti, Claudia Zanardello, Federica Gallocchio, Vito A. Baldassarro, Alessandra Moressa, Lorenzo Zanella, Michele Sannia, Greta Foiani, Corinne Quadalti, Maura Cescatti, Valentina Burato, Margherita Soncin, Marzia Mancin, Luciana Giardino, Franco Mutinelli, Marta Vascellari, and Laura Calzà.\</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/how-growing-up-alone-changes-the-brain-s-response-to-alcohol-2026-03-26/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Early life stress fundamentally alters alcohol processing in the brain</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">Apr 7th 2026, 14:00</div>
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<p><p>Experiencing social isolation during early developmental years can lead to increased anxiety and a higher preference for alcohol later in life. A new study in rats shows that these early stressors physically alter how the brain responds to alcohol, specifically changing how the chemical dopamine is regulated in regions linked to reward processing. The findings were published in the journal <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addicn.2025.100231">Addiction Neuroscience</a>.</p>
<p>As children and teenagers navigate critical periods of brain development, social contact helps shape their neural circuits. Environmental stressors during this sensitive window can disrupt normal developmental trajectories. Experiencing isolation or neglect during youth can elevate the risk of mood disorders and substance use issues in adulthood.</p>
<p>Researchers from Binghamton University and Brigham Young University wanted to understand the biological mechanisms behind this vulnerability. Lead author Gavin J. Vaughan and senior author Anushree N. Karkhanis, both affiliated with Binghamton University, focused on a brain structure called the ventral pallidum.</p>
<p>The ventral pallidum is a small cluster of cells resting deep within the brain. It acts as a central hub for assessing the value of different experiences. The region helps an individual weigh whether a stimulus is rewarding and worth pursuing or aversive and worth avoiding.</p>
<p>Cells in the ventral pallidum receive constant chemical signals from other parts of the brain. One of the primary messenger chemicals they receive is dopamine. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that helps the brain recognize and learn from rewarding events.</p>
<p>The researchers designed an experiment to see how a lack of peer interaction during youth might dictate the way these dopamine signals function. They specifically wanted to see how early isolation changed the way alcohol interacts with the brain tissue.</p>
<p>The research team used a laboratory rat model to closely study the developmental effects of early life stress. They separated young Long-Evans rats into two distinct living situations. One group matured alongside peers in standard communal housing arrangements.</p>
<p>The second group was housed completely alone during a period equivalent to human adolescence. After a six-week developmental window, the researchers tested the anxiety levels of the fully grown rats. They subjected both sets of animals to a battery of behavioral obstacles.</p>
<p>One such test was the open-field assay, which places the animal in a large, enclosed arena. Rats are naturally prey animals and tend to hug the walls of new environments, avoiding the exposed center. The isolated rats were much more hesitant to leave the safety of the corners and venture into the middle of the arena.</p>
<p>Another test involved an elevated platform shaped like a cross. Two of the platform arms had high walls, while the other two arms were completely open and exposed to the bright lights of the room. The isolated rats spent far less time exploring the open arms, heavily favoring the enclosed spaces.</p>
<p>A third assessment used a long, gradient track separated into four varying zones. The first section offered high, protective walls, while the final section was entirely unshielded. The isolated rats spent much more of their time hiding in the first, enclosed section than the group-housed rats.</p>
<p>Across the different tests, the socially isolated rats consistently displayed heightened behaviors associated with anxiety. Female rats in both the isolated and group-housed categories tended to show elevated overall anxiety behaviors compared to the male rats. The researchers confirmed that the stress of juvenile isolation produced lasting psychological changes.</p>
<p>After establishing the behavioral differences, the researchers tested the animals’ natural preference for alcohol. Over an eight-week span, the rats were given free access to two drinking bottles in their cages. One bottle contained normal tap water and the other contained a twenty percent alcohol solution.</p>
<p>The researchers used an intermittent access structure for the drinking trials to simulate binge-like consumption patterns. The animals received the alcohol solution for twenty-four hours at a time, followed by a day of only water. The socially isolated animals consistently demonstrated a higher relative preference for the alcohol solution than the group-housed animals.</p>
<p>To see if this preference was compulsive, the team modified the experiment. They introduced varying amounts of quinine, a bitter-tasting compound, into the alcohol solution. The goal was to measure aversion-resistant drinking behavior. </p>
<p>Aversion-resistant consumption mimics the behaviors seen in severe human alcohol use disorders, where individuals continue consuming alcohol despite severe negative emotional or physical consequences. The researchers found that adding the bitter flavor deterred both sets of animals equally. </p>
<p>The isolated rats did not drink higher volumes of the bitter alcohol than their peers. Male rats tolerated the bitter taste slightly more than female rats across all groups, but the general decline in drinking was consistent. While early isolation induced a general preference for alcohol, it did not cause the rats to tolerate the bitter taste.</p>
<p>To see what was happening on a biological level, the team examined delicate slices of the ventral pallidum tissue from the subjects. They used a laboratory technique called fast-scan cyclic voltammetry. This process utilizes tiny carbon-fiber electrodes to measure rapid chemical changes. </p>
<p>The researchers suspended the brain slices in an oxygenated fluid bath that mimics the natural environment of the skull. Applying small electrical currents to the tissue stimulates the local neurons, prompting them to release dopamine. The probes read the dopamine levels in real time as the chemical flooded the tissue and was cleared away. </p>
<p>Initially, the baseline release of dopamine in the ventral pallidum was identical across both groups of rats. Growing up alone did not alter the natural resting state of this specific chemical pathway. The speed at which the dopamine was released and absorbed remained unchanged.</p>
<p>The functional differences only became apparent when the researchers applied a liquid alcohol solution directly to the brain slices. In a typical rat raised in a group, exposure to alcohol caused a distinct drop in the total amount of dopamine released in the ventral pallidum. </p>
<p>The brain tissue from the socially isolated rats reacted quite differently. The alcohol was much less effective at suppressing dopamine release in these animals. The developmental stress of growing up alone had fundamentally muted the brain’s typical chemical response to the drug.</p>
<p>The researchers also varied their electrical stimulation to mimic rapid bursts of dopamine release, which occur naturally when neurons fire in quick succession. They found that alcohol’s effect on these rapid bursts varied drastically depending on both the sex of the rat and its housing history.</p>
<p>In group-housed male rats, alcohol successfully depressed these rapid dopamine bursts. That depressive effect completely vanished in the isolated males. In contrast, alcohol had no impact on the dopamine bursts in group-housed females, but it actively suppressed them in the isolated females.</p>
<p>These sex-based physical differences highlight the sheer difficulty of modeling human psychiatric conditions in animals. Animal behavior can vary widely depending on the specific testing environment. The researchers note that laboratory animals are highly sensitive to small changes, like the brightness of the lights in an assessment room.</p>
<p>Measuring psychological concepts like anxiety or addiction requires relying on multiple overlapping tests to get an accurate picture. While the findings point to clear anatomical changes in the ventral pallidum, the exact molecular shifts driving these sex differences remain unknown. It is not entirely clear which cellular receptors are changing in response to the early life stress.</p>
<p>Alcohol interacts with several signaling proteins in the brain, including receptors that respond to a chemical called acetylcholine. The researchers suspect that early stress might change the physical shape or quantity of these specific receptors on the surface of the dopamine cells.</p>
<p>Moving forward, the team hopes to identify the precise proteins that mediate this altered dopamine response. Pinpointing these microscopic cellular targets represents an early step toward developing targeted medical treatments. The ultimate goal is to find targeted therapies that can alleviate alcohol use disorders that stem from childhood adversity.</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addicn.2025.100231" target="_blank">Adolescent social isolation associated changes in ethanol-induced dopamine regulation in the ventral pallidum</a>,” was authored by Gavin J. Vaughan, Makenzie R. Lehr, Gina M. Magardino, Abigail M. Kelley, Michelle A. Chan, Madison C. Heitkamp, Jordan T. Yorgason, and Anushree N. Karkhanis.</p></p>
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<td><a href="https://www.psypost.org/tracing-the-origins-of-autism-back-to-a-grandmother-s-pregnancy-2026-03-26/" style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing:-1px;margin:0;padding:0 0 2px;font-weight: bold;font-size: 19px;line-height: 20px;color:#222;">Autism associated with age of maternal grandparents in new study</a>
<div style="font-family:Helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:left;color:#999;font-size:11px;font-weight:bold;line-height:15px;">Apr 7th 2026, 12:00</div>
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<p><p>A new study published in <em><a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/aur.70074">Autism Research</a></em> reveals that the age of maternal grandparents when they have children is linked to the likelihood of their grandchildren developing autism. The research shows that this association varies substantially across different racial and ethnic groups. These variations suggest that environmental and social factors operate alongside biology to influence child development across multiple generations.</p>
<p>Autism spectrum disorder is a neurodevelopmental condition characterized by repetitive behaviors and challenges with social communication. In recent decades, the identified prevalence of autism has grown rapidly. In California, the proportion of children diagnosed with the condition increased dramatically between the early 2000s and recent years. During this period, the diagnostic rates among historically underrepresented minority groups surpassed the rates seen in white children.</p>
<p>As diagnostic rates have shifted, demographic patterns in family planning have also changed. The average age of parents at the time of childbirth has steadily increased in the United States. Past research has established a firm association between older parental age and a higher chance of having a child on the autism spectrum.</p>
<p>Recent evidence has expanded this timeline backward, pointing to the age of the grandparents. When grandparents conceive the parents, their age may carry biological and social implications for the grandchildren. To understand this multigenerational pattern, Ting Chow, a public health researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles, and her colleagues initiated a large scale investigation.</p>
<p>Previous investigations into grandparental age focused almost exclusively on populations of white, European ancestry. The researchers wanted to see if the same age patterns appeared within a highly diverse population. They hypothesized that studying various racial and ethnic groups could help determine whether these age links are universal biological traits or markers for differing environmental conditions.</p>
<p>The biological mechanisms behind multigenerational health outcomes are still under active investigation. One possibility involves changes to the germ cells, which are the sperm and eggs. Environmental exposures or the natural aging process can alter epigenetic marks. These marks act as a chemical control system that turns genes on or off without altering the underlying genetic code.</p>
<p>Aging can also lead to the accumulation of damage in the mitochondria, the energy producing structures inside cells. A child inherits mitochondria exclusively from the mother’s egg. A female fetus develops all the eggs she will ever have while still inside her mother’s womb. Because of this timeline, the grandmother’s age and environment during pregnancy can directly influence the cellular health of the eggs that will eventually become her grandchildren.</p>
<p>Older grandfathers might pass along new genetic mutations or epigenetic changes through their sperm. Unlike female eggs, male sperm reproduce continuously from adolescence onward. This constant replication provides more opportunities for cellular errors to accumulate as a man ages.</p>
<p>To explore these possibilities, the researchers analyzed birth records from California. They linked the health records of children born between 2001 and 2019 to the birth records of their mothers, who were born between 1983 and 2001. The team also incorporated diagnostic data from the California Department of Developmental Services to identify autism cases.</p>
<p>This complex data linkage created a study population of more than 1.7 million mother and child pairs for the grandmother analysis. Within this massive group, the researchers identified nearly 28,000 children diagnosed with autism. They then looked backward in time to determine the exact age of the maternal grandmother and maternal grandfather when the mother was born.</p>
<p>The researchers categorized the grandparent ages into four brackets. They defined younger grandparents as those between 18 and 24 years old. The reference group consisted of grandparents between 25 and 29 years old. They also created categories for those who were 30 to 34 years old and those who were 35 to 55 years old. </p>
<p>They used statistical models to compare the odds of an autism diagnosis among grandchildren based on these different age brackets. Their calculations accounted for the birth years of the child and the mother, the sex of the child, and the number of previous pregnancies the grandmother had experienced.</p>
<p>Overall, the team found that grandchildren had a slightly higher chance of being diagnosed with autism if their maternal grandparents were either unusually young or relatively old when the mother was born. But these broad averages masked distinct variations among different racial and ethnic communities. The researchers observed a pronounced U shaped statistical curve specifically among white grandparents.</p>
<p>For white grandmothers and grandfathers, both the youngest and oldest age brackets were associated with an elevated likelihood of autism in grandchildren. Among Hispanic grandparents, the mathematical relationship looked different. Elevated odds for autism in the grandchildren emerged only when Hispanic grandmothers and grandfathers were in the oldest age category.</p>
<p>The patterns changed again when looking at other demographic groups. For Asian Pacific Islander families, increased odds of autism were only present among older grandmothers. In Black families, the researchers noted a decrease in documented autism odds associated with younger grandmothers. At the same time, older Black grandfathers were linked to an elevated rate of autism in their grandchildren.</p>
<p>The study authors suggest these racial and ethnic variations point to different underlying mechanisms. Among white populations, exceptionally young childbearing often correlates with lower socioeconomic status. The challenges associated with limited resources may cascade across generations to influence the health of the grandchildren.</p>
<p>The inverse pattern seen with younger Black grandmothers might be explained by a phenomenon known as live birth bias. This statistical concept implies that the most vulnerable fetuses might not survive to birth. If socioeconomically disadvantaged younger grandmothers experience high rates of pregnancy loss, the children who are born might represent a particularly resilient subset, artificially lowering the observed autism rate in the data.</p>
<p>In contrast, older grandparents across most demographic groups displayed a positive link with autism in their grandchildren. This consistency aligns with the biological theories of accumulating cellular damage or genetic mutations. Environmental factors, which disproportionately affect minority neighborhoods, might also combine with advanced age to negatively influence reproductive health.</p>
<p>Historically, Black and Hispanic populations in California have been more likely to face occupational hazards, higher levels of financial stress, and systemic discrimination. Chronic stress and toxic environmental exposures can alter fetal development. If a grandmother experiences these hardships while pregnant, the developing eggs inside her female fetus could undergo changes that eventually affect the grandchild.</p>
<p>The researchers acknowledged several caveats in their analysis. Relying entirely on birth and diagnostic records means that some nuances of family life remain unmeasured. For instance, the state databases did not contain comprehensive information on lifestyle habits, such as smoking and alcohol use. The researchers also lacked data on family histories of psychiatric conditions.</p>
<p>The investigation was strictly limited to the maternal genetic line. The researchers focused on the maternal grandparents because paternal identifiers on older birth records were historically less complete. This data gap prevented an equivalent analysis of the paternal grandparents and their generational influence. Data availability also forced the researchers to exclude older mothers who were born before electronic records began in 1983.</p>
<p>Future research will need to incorporate detailed biological, social, and environmental data. Expanding this work to diverse populations outside of California could help clarify how different social contexts interact with genetic inheritance. Tracing both the maternal and paternal ancestral lines would provide a more complete picture of family health timelines.</p>
<p>The study, “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/aur.70074" target="_blank">Age, Race, and Ethnicity of Maternal Grandparents in Autism Spectrum Disorder, a California Multigenerational Study</a>,” was authored by Ting Chow, Qi Meng, Jingyuan Xiao, Karl O’Sharkey, Zeyan Liew, and Beate Ritz.</p></p>
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<p><strong>Forwarded by:<br />
Michael Reeder LCPC<br />
Baltimore, MD</strong></p>
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