Study finds that COVID-19 lockdowns have caused rapid brain aging in adolescents
A new study published in
COVID-19 lockdown effects on adolescent brain structure suggest accelerated maturation that is more pronounced in females than in males | PNAS
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2403200121
COVID lockdowns caused premature aging of adolescent brains - Earth.com
https://www.earth.com/news/covid-lockdowns-caused-premature-aging-of-adolescent-brains/
In the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, governments around the world implemented lockdowns, including stay-at-home orders and school closures, to prevent the spread of infection. Numerous studies have examined how the disruption caused by lockdowns affected daily life and social activities, and surprisingly, they have revealed that lockdowns made people feel happier.
Pandemic reduces happiness, but lockdowns boost it: study
Research has shown that adolescents, a period of significant emotional, behavioral, and social development, also felt happier during lockdown. However, the lockdown severely restricted social interactions, leading to increased anxiety, depression, and stress, especially among young women.
A research paper published in PNAS by a research group at the University of Washington investigated the brains of adolescents during lockdown. The research group measured the subjects' brain maturation by examining the thickness of the cerebral cortex, the brain's outer layer of tissue. It is known that the cerebral cortex naturally thins with age, even in teenagers, and that this thinning is accelerated by chronic stress and adversity. Thinning of the cerebral cortex increases the risk of developing neuropsychiatric and behavioral disorders such as anxiety and depression, and these disorders are particularly common in adolescents.
The research team has been investigating changes in the brain structure of adolescents aged 9 to 17 since 2018. The survey was originally scheduled to be completed in 2020, but due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in the same year, the survey was postponed until 2021. This has made it possible to examine what changes occurred in the brain structure of young people before and after the pandemic.
The research team used brain scan data to develop a model to predict the 'normal rate of thinning' of the cerebral cortex during adolescence. They then compared the data with brain scans collected in 2021 to determine whether young people's brains were maturing normally. The analysis revealed that brain maturation accelerated by an average of 4.2 years for women and 1.4 years for men compared to before the lockdown.
The accelerated brain maturation (aging) was particularly pronounced in women, with thinning observed throughout the brain. In contrast, men only showed thinning around the visual cortex, and did not show the same degree of brain aging as women.
'We think of the COVID-19 pandemic as a health crisis, but it's also becoming clear that it has brought about other major changes in our lives, especially for teenagers,' said Patricia Kuhl, lead author of the study and co-director of the Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences (I-LABS) at the University of Washington.
'At the start of the pandemic, we started thinking about what brain measurements we could use to estimate how the pandemic lockdowns affected the brain,' said Neva Corrigan, lead author of the paper and a researcher at I-LABS. 'What does it mean for teenagers to not go to school, not play sports, not go out, and to be at home instead of being in social groups?'
Kuhl suggests that these results may be related to the importance of social interaction for adolescent girls. Adolescent girls tend to rely more on 'intimate relationships with friends' and 'sharing emotions and conversations,' while boys tend to engage in physical activity when they get together with friends and are less dependent on others than girls. 'What the pandemic really did seem to do was isolate girls,' Kuhl said. 'All teenagers were isolated, but girls seemed to suffer more severely, and the impact on their brains was much more severe.'
While Kuhl said it's unlikely the cerebral cortex will ever return to its previous thickness, he noted that the rate of thinning may slow and some recovery may occur as normal social interactions resume, but further research is needed to determine whether this recovery occurs.
'In older adults, the faster the cortical thinning, the more cognitive function declines, such as information processing speed and the ability to complete everyday tasks. However, there is little data on cortical thinning in teenagers, so further research is important,' Kuhl said.
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