An analysis of the relation between metabolic measures and childhood mood dysregulation

Despite being found in up to 3.3% of children between the ages of 9-18, mood dysregulation, a component of multiple mood disorders defined as the propensity to respond to an external stimulus with a severity beyond what would be expected of the response, remains poorly understood. At the same time, metabolic problems are increasingly more common in the United States, with up to 9.2% of children and adolescents (Magge, Goodman, & Armstrong, 2017) and 34% of adults (American Heart Association, 2015) meeting at least three criteria for the metabolic syndrome, a syndrome that indicates risk of heart disease. Research has demonstrated that the prevalence of several psychiatric disorders, including mood disorders, is inversely correlated with metabolic health (Skilton, Moulin, Terra, & Bonnet, 2007; Ugur et al., 2018). This project will further the investigation into the connection between the severity of mood dysregulation and severity of metabolic problems through a cross-sectional study of children and adolescents aged 7-17 from the greater Vermont and upstate New York area, along with their families. It is hypothesized that mood dysregulation, like the mood disorders with which it associates, is correlated inversely with metabolic health. After examining an initial statistical model where a latent metabolic health variable is predicted solely by a dysregulation severity, additional models will be examined to explore whether the association is better explained by having parental behavioral data and diet predict or moderate the association. Overall, this study will increase knowledge of the physiological correlates of mood dysregulation, and by carefully assessing those correlates, may provide clinicians with information about the assessment and treatment of children with dysregulation. Abstract citations: American Heart Association (2015). What is Metabolic Syndrome? Magge, S. N., Goodman, E., & Armstrong, S. C. (2017). The Metabolic Syndrome in Children and Adolescents: Shifting the Focus to Cardiometabolic Risk Factor Clustering. Pediatrics. doi:10.1542/peds.2017-1603 Skilton, M. R., Moulin, P., Terra, J.-L., & Bonnet, F. (2007). Associations Between Anxiety, Depression, and the Metabolic Syndrome. Biological Psychiatry, 62(11), 1251-1257. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsych.2007.01.012 Ugur, C., Uneri, O. S., Goker, Z., Sekmen, E., Aydemir, H., & Solmaz, E. (2018). The assessment of serum lipid profiles of children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Psychiatry Research, 264, 231-235. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychres.2018.04.00