Background: Childhood emotional neglect (CEN) confers a great risk for developing multiple psychiatric disorders; however, the neural basis for this association remains unknown. Using a dynamic functional connectivity approach, this study aimed to examine the effects of CEN experience on functional brain networks in young adults.Method: In total, 21 healthy young adults with CEN experience and 26 without childhood trauma experience were recruited. The childhood trauma experience was assessed using the childhood trauma questionnaire (CTQ), and eligible participants underwent resting-state functional MRI. Sliding windows and k-means clustering were used to identify temporal features of large-scale functional connectivity states (frequency, mean dwell time, and transition numbers).Result: Dynamic analysis revealed two separate connection states: state 1 was more frequent and characterized by extensive weak connections between the brain regions. State 2 was relatively infrequent and characterized by extensive strong connections between the brain regions. Compared to the control group, the CEN group had a longer mean dwell time in state 1 and significantly decreased transition numbers between states 1 and 2.Conclusion: The CEN experience affects the temporal properties of young adults' functional brain connectivity. Young adults with CEN experience tend to be stable in state 1 (extensive weak connections between the brain regions), reducing transitions between states, and reflecting impaired metastability or functional network flexibility.

Childhood trauma encompasses various subtypes, and evidence suggests that neurodevelopmental damage differs across these subtypes. However, the specific impact of childhood emotional neglect (CEN), a distinct subtype of childhood trauma, on the microstructural integrity of brain white matter remains unclear. Therefore, the present study aims to investigate the effects of CEN on the microstructure of brain white matter in young adults using diffusion tensor imaging. After administering online questionnaires, conducting interviews, and obtaining diagnoses from specialized physicians, we recruited 20 young adults with a history of CEN and 20 young adults with no history of childhood trauma. Using automating fiber tract quantification (driven by a diffusion tensor model), we traced the 20 primary white matter fibers and divided each fiber into 100 nodes for analysis. Group differences in fractional anisotropy (FA) at each node of each fiber were then examined. The results revealed that the FA values at nodes 1–35 of the right thalamic radiation were consistently lower in the emotional neglect group compared to the control group (after FEW correction, cluster threshold = 22, p-threshold = 0.005). These findings suggest an association between CEN and reduced FA values in the right thalamic radiation, indicating alterations in brain white matter. Overall, our results contribute to the theoretical understanding of how “experience shapes the brain,” providing new insights into the neurostructural consequences of childhood emotional neglect.

Representational momentum (RM) refers to the phenomenon in which an observer's judgment of the final location of a previously viewed moving target is often displaced forward in the direction of motion. This phenomenon is an adaptive mechanism that compensates for neural processing delays and is closely associated with visual cortex function. However, the impact of age-related decline of visual cortex function on the manifestations of RM remains unclear. The present study examined differences in the RM effect between older (N = 82) and younger adults (N = 74) using a cursor-positioning task. Additionally, resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to explore the potential neural substrates that underlie these differences, employing amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation (ALFF, reflecting the intensity of neural activity) and regional homogeneity (ReHo, reflecting the synchronization of neural activity) as indicators. Our findings indicate a significant increase in RM among older adults compared with younger adults. Neuroimaging data revealed a significant decrease in ALFF and ReHo within extensive regions of the visual cortex in older adults, validating age-related differences in this cortical area. More importantly, ALFF values in the bilateral visual area 3 and ReHo values in the bilateral visual area 2 in older adults exhibited a strong negative correlation with their RM effects. These results suggest that larger RM in older adults may be functional compensation for aging of the visual cortex.