Socioeconomic status is associated with reward processing, interleukin 1b and striatal connectivity in males with major depressive disorder.

Poster Session C - Sunday, April 14, 2024, 5:00 – 7:00 pm EDT, Sheraton Hall ABC

Sara Jani^1,2 (sara.jani@mail.utoronto.ca), Stefanie Hassel³, Susan Rotzinger^1,2,4,5, Sakina Rizvi^1,2, Jane Foster^4,5,6, Gustavo Turecki^7,8, Sidney Kennedy^1,2, Benicio Frey^4,5, Katharine Dunlop^1,2; ¹Unity Health Toronto, ²University of Toronto, ³University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada, ⁴St. Joseph’s Healthcare, Hamilton, Canada, ⁵McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada, ⁶University Health Network, Toronto, Canada, ⁷McGill University, ⁸Douglas Mental Health University Institute, Verdun, Canada

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is a common disorder with multifactorial risk factors. Socioeconomic status (SES) is one such risk factor, and is linked to MDD treatment outcomes and symptom severity. SES is associated with altered resting state functional connectivity (RSFC) in reward processing circuitry and elevated proinflammatory cytokine levels in non-depressed individuals. However, the role of SES in exacerbating MDD psychopathology is poorly understood. To address this gap, data regarding SES, depression severity, self-reported reward processing using the Behavioral Inhibition/Behavioral Activation Scale (BIS/BAS), serum pro-inflammatory cytokine levels (IL-6, IL-1β), and RSFC was collected for 323 participants (211 MDD, 112 control, 63.2% female) at six sites. General linear models assessing the effects of MDD diagnosis and SES on self-reported reward processing and pro-inflammatory cytokine levels. Whole-brain seed-to-voxel functional connectivity analyses were performed for the dorsal (DS) and ventral striatum (VS). Relative to controls, MDD participants from low SES backgrounds had lower BIS/BAS drive and altered striatal RSFC with temporoparietal regions. We also observed a positive relationship between SES and proinflammatory cytokines in males with MDD. Our results shed light on the role of SES in exacerbating the deficits in reward processing, and in contributing to the alterations in resting state striatal connectivity and pro-inflammatory phenotype observed in individuals with MDD. Better characterizing this relationship may inform future treatment approaches and intervention development.

Topic Area: METHODS: Neuroimaging