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Children who have experienced abuse, sexual abuse, or other severe psychological trauma usually experience stronger emotions than their peers. They also have difficulty controlling them, but scientists are confident that this can be learned.
A group of researchers from the University of Washington, led by psychologist Kate McLaughlin, studied what happens in the brains of teenage abusers when they look at images that evoke emotional reactions and try to control them.
The study involved 42 adolescents (boys and girls) aged 13 to 19 years, half of them experienced physical or sexual abuse in childhood. The scientists tracked the brain activity of teenagers who viewed the photos using magnetic resonance imaging.
Teenagers were shown neutral, “pleasant” and “unpleasant” images and asked not to limit their natural emotions. The neutral images were nature views or photographs of objects like a coffee cup or glasses. The “pleasant” and “unpleasant” images showed people with different facial expressions – for example, a smiling happy family or two people arguing aggressively.
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The brain activity of adolescents from the two groups (experienced and not experienced violence in childhood) did not differ significantly when viewing “pleasant” photos. But when it came to “unpleasant” images, teen survivors showed increased activity in areas of the brain that are responsible for detecting potential threats – including the amygdala, which plays a key role in shaping emotions and detecting threats. Keith McLaughlin explains this by saying that the brain, in a situation of constant danger, gets used to being in a state of increased vigilance, trying to detect potential threats everywhere.
In the second experiment participants were shown other pictures but were asked to try to heighten their emotional responses to the “pleasant” images and suppress their reactions to the “unpleasant” ones. To do this, they were taught the technique of “cognitive reappraisal,” which is to try to look at the situation differently – for example, suggesting to themselves that the people in the “pleasant” photographs are acquaintances and family members, or that the subjects themselves are participating in what is happening. In the case of “unpleasant” images, it was proposed, on the contrary, to suggest to oneself that everything depicted is happening with strangers or is not real at all.
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Once again, participants from both groups showed similar brain activity when viewing the “enjoyable” images. However, the “unpleasant” images triggered high activity in the prefrontal cortex of the abused teenagers as they tried to suppress the emotional response. The prefrontal cortex is associated with higher order thinking, it integrates information from various areas of the brain, controls emotions and behavior, and guides decision making.
As a result, activity in the amygdala of the brain changed in adolescents from both groups to about the same extent – although victims of violence took more effort to control their emotions. Techniques like “cognitive reappraisal” are already being used in the treatment of traumatized children. Kate McLaughlin believes that this study confirms their effectiveness and may contribute to the development of new treatments.
Подробнее см К. McLaughlin «Child maltreatment and neural systems underlying emotion regulation», Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 2015, vol. 54, № 9.