Science News about Children and Adolescents

Study launched to test possible preventive treatment for schizophrenia in high risk youth

Science Update • May 01, 2008

NIMH has recently awarded a grant to study whether an intensive computerized training program can help prevent those at high risk of developing schizophrenia from having a first psychotic episode and improve adaptive functioning. The program is based on principles of brain development and resilience and an understanding of the processes that go awry in schizophrenia.

Journal Highlights Effectiveness of Research Based Psychotherapies for Youth

Science Update • April 15, 2008

Reviews of the current research on psychosocial and behavioral therapies, or psychotherapies, for children and adolescents found a number of "well established" and "probably efficacious" treatments for many mental disorders. For example, six were "probably efficacious" for anxiety disorders, and two were "well established" for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), according to scientists funded by NIMH and the National Institute on Drug Abuse, divisions of the National Institutes of Health.

Maintenance Treatment Crucial for Teens’ Recovery from Depression

Science Update • April 08, 2008

Long-term maintenance treatment is likely to sustain improvement and prevent recurrence among adolescents with major depression, according to an NIMH-funded study published in the April 2008 issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry.

Newly Awarded Autism Centers of Excellence to Further Autism Research

Press Release • April 01, 2008

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced on April 1, 2008, the latest recipients of the Autism Centers of Excellence (ACE) program.

State Survey Finds FDA “Black Box” Warning Correlates with Curtailed Antidepressant Prescriptions

Science Update • March 14, 2008

After the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a “black box” warning on antidepressant medications, Nebraskan doctors began prescribing fewer antidepressant medications to children and teens and referring more patients to specialists, according to a state survey. The study, which involved NIMH-funded researchers, was published in the February 2008 issue of the Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology.

Teens with Treatment-resistant Depression More Likely to Get Better with Switch to Combination Therapy

Press Release • February 26, 2008

Teens with difficult-to-treat depression who do not respond to a first antidepressant medication are more likely to get well if they switch to another antidepressant medication and add psychotherapy rather than just switching to another antidepressant, according to a large, multi-site trial funded by the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). The results of the Treatment of SSRI-resistant Depression in Adolescents (TORDIA) trial were published February 27, 2008, in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

Cold, Unfeeling Traits Linked to Distinctive Brain Patterns in Kids with Severe Conduct Problems

Science Update • February 20, 2008

The callous, unemotional characteristics of some children and adolescents who bully or steal or have other severely disruptive behavior problems may have partial roots in a brain area called the amygdala.

Gene Variants Protect Against Adult Depression Triggered by Childhood Stress

Press Release • February 04, 2008

Certain variations in a gene that helps regulate response to stress tend to protect adults who were abused in childhood from developing depression, according to new research funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), part of the National Institutes of Health. Adults who had been abused but didn’t have the variations in the gene had twice the symptoms of moderate to severe depression, compared to those with the protective variations.

Autism Risk Higher in People with Gene Variant

Press Release • January 10, 2008

Scientists have found a variation in a gene that may raise the risk of developing autism, especially when the variant is inherited from mothers rather than fathers. The research was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), part of the National Institutes of Health.

Scientists Can Predict Psychotic Illness in up to 80 Percent of High-Risk Youth

Press Release • January 07, 2008

Youth who are going to develop psychosis can be identified before their illness becomes full-blown 35 percent of the time if they meet widely accepted criteria for risk, but that figure rises to 65 to 80 percent if they have certain combinations of risk factors, the largest study of its kind has shown. Knowing what these combinations are can help scientists predict who is likely to develop the illnesses within two to three years with the same accuracy that other kinds of risk factors can predict major medical diseases, such as diabetes.

Ethnicity Predicts How Gene Variations Affect Response to Schizophrenia Medications

Science Update • January 02, 2008

Different variations in the same gene influence how well different ethnic groups, and people within the same ethnic group, respond to various antipsychotic medications, report NIMH-funded researchers. If confirmed, their findings could one day help clinicians predict which medication is most likely to help a patient, based on his or her genetic makeup.

Family-Centered Intervention Effectively Reduces Risky Behavior Among Hispanic Youth

Science Update • December 20, 2007

Science Update December 20, 2007 Family-centered Intervention Effectively Reduces Risky Behavior Among Hispanic Youth A family-centered program that improves parent-child dynamics and family functioning is more effective at discouraging Hispanic youth from engaging in risky behavior than programs that target specific behaviors, according to a study published in the December 2007 issue of the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology.

Behavioral Therapy Effectively Treats Children with Social Phobia

Science Update • December 17, 2007

A behavioral therapy designed to treat children diagnosed with social phobia helped them overcome more of their symptoms than the antidepressant fluoxetine (Prozac).

IQ Boost From Breast Milk Linked to Gene-Environment Interaction

Science Update • December 17, 2007

A new study shows that the intellectual boost associated with breast milk is only attained if a child has inherited one of two versions of a specific gene.

Behavioral Program May Stabilize Stress Hormone Patterns in Foster Children

Science Update • November 30, 2007

An intervention designed to enhance family interaction and improve foster parenting skills may benefit young foster children who had experienced extreme neglect or maltreatment in early life.

Brain Matures a Few Years Late in ADHD, But Follows Normal Pattern

Press Release • November 12, 2007

In youth with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), the brain matures in a normal pattern but is delayed three years in some regions, on average, compared to youth without the disorder.

Preschoolers with Three or More Coexisting Disorders Show No Response to ADHD Medication Treatment

Press Release • November 05, 2007

Preschoolers who are diagnosed with ADHD are not likely to respond to treatment with the stimulant methylphenidate, regardless of dosage, if they also have three or more coexisting disorders, according to a recent analysis of data from the Preschoolers with ADHD Treatment Study (PATS).

NIH Funds New Program to Investigate Causes and Treatment of Autism

Science Update • October 30, 2007

The National Institutes of Health will intensify its efforts to find the causes of autism and identify new treatments for the disorder, through a new research program.

Behavioral Intervention Normalizes Stress-related Hormone in High-Risk Kids

Science Update • October 24, 2007

A family-based behavioral intervention that helps prevent social and behavior problems in high-risk preschoolers also may help normalize their cortisol levels when they anticipate stressful situations, results of a new NIMH study suggest.

Depressed Adolescents Respond Best to Combination Treatment

Press Release • October 01, 2007

A combination of psychotherapy and antidepressant medication appears to be the most effective treatment for adolescents with major depressive disorder—more than medication alone or psychotherapy alone, according to results from a major clinical trial funded by the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).

Genes Linked to Suicidal Thinking During Antidepressant Treatment

Press Release • September 27, 2007

Specific variations in two genes are linked to suicidal thinking that sometimes occurs in people taking the most commonly prescribed class of antidepressants, according to a large study led by scientists at the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).

Drops in SSRI prescription rates may coincide with increases in youth suicides

Science Update • September 19, 2007

A 2004 spike in suicide rates may have coincided with a drop in antidepressant prescriptions for youth, following warnings from U.S and European regulatory agencies that the medications might trigger suicidal thoughts.

Family Involvement and Focused Intervention May be Key to Helping Teens with Bulimia

Science Update • September 17, 2007

Family-based treatment for adolescent bulimia nervosa (FBT-BN) is more effective than an individual-based therapy called supportive psychotherapy (SPT) in helping teens overcome bulimia according to an NIMH-funded study.

New Research to Help Youth with Mental Disorders Transition to Adulthood

Science Update • September 05, 2007

As young people with mental health disorders transition from adolescence to adulthood, they frequently face new and difficult challenges such as the loss of state-issued benefits like Medicaid and foster care, or loss of family-based insurance coverage.

Rates of Bipolar Diagnosis in Youth Rapidly Climbing, Treatment Patterns Similar to Adults

Press Release • September 03, 2007

The number of visits to a doctor's office that resulted in a diagnosis of bipolar disorder in children and adolescents has increased by 40 times over the last decade, reported researchers funded in part by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Bipolar Youth Show Distinct Pattern of Brain Development

Science Update • August 28, 2007

The first picturess of the brain changing before-and-after the onset of pediatric bipolar disorder reveal a distinct pattern of development, when compared to that seen in healthy youth or in childhood onset schizophrenia.

Behavioral Interventions Effective for Preschoolers with ADHD

Science Update • August 15, 2007

Two types of early interventions designed to reduce symptoms of attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in preschoolers may be effective alternatives or additions to medication treatment, according to a recent NIMH-funded study.

Half of Children With Autism May be Diagnosable Soon After Their First Birthday

Science Update • August 10, 2007

About half of children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) can be diagnosed soon after their first birthday; others with the disorder may appear to develop normally until that age and then falter or regress during their second year, NIMH-funded researchers have discovered.

Parents' Diagnoses Help to Distinguish Childhood Bipolar Disorder from Severe Mood Dysregulation

Science Update • August 06, 2007

The parents of children who have bipolar disorder are more likely to have bipolar disorder themselves than the parents of children who have severe mood dysregulation (SMD).

Improvement Following ADHD Treatment Sustained in Most Children

Press Release • July 20, 2007

Most children treated in a variety of ways for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) showed sustained improvement after three years in a major follow-up study funded by the National Institutes of Health's (NIH) National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).