Childhood adversity modulation of central autonomic network components during cognitive regulation of emotion in major depressive disorder and borderline personality disorder.

Abstract in brief

• The study explores how adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) impact brain regions involved in emotion regulation and heart rate variability (HRV) in individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD), borderline personality disorder (BPD), and healthy controls, especially during stress regulation tasks.
• Results show that ACEs are linked to increased activity in the central autonomic network (CAN) and salience network in MDD patients, suggesting different brain responses to stress compared to BPD, where brain-autonomic coupling (connected activity between brain regions and HRV) was more prominent.
• These findings imply that ACEs may cause distinctive changes in brain activity and emotional regulation mechanisms in MDD and BPD, potentially contributing to the emotional processing difficulties seen in these disorders.]