N. Penzel

Unraveling Suicidal Ideation and Behaviors in a Global Cohort of Individuals at Clinical High-Risk for Psychosis: Multivariable Correlates and Subthreshold Psychotic Symptoms.

INTRODUCTION Suicidal ideation and behaviors (SIB) are common among individuals at clinical high risk for psychosis (CHR-P), but their relationship with the overall clinical profile remains unclear. This study aimed to identify sociodemographic/clinical factors associated with SIB in CHR-P individuals and to examine whether subthreshold psychotic symptom severity increases with suicidal risk. METHODS Data from the AMP SCZ initiative included 1443 CHR-P participants aged 12-30 years. SIB were assessed using the Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale (C-SSRS). Three Elastic Net regression models examined associations between suicidal ideation severity, intensity, and behaviors using 54 variables spanning sociodemographics, general psychopathology, subthreshold psychotic symptoms, and socio-occupational functioning. Moreover, ANCOVA compared overall psychotic symptom severity across five groups defined by increasing severity on the C-SSRS. RESULTS Sixty-eight percent of participants reported lifetime suicidal ideation, and 26% reported previous suicidal behaviors. Model performance was modest but significant (cross-validated ideation severity: R2 = 0.161, RMSE = 0.916; ideation intensity: R2 = 0.193, RMSE = 0.898; suicidal behavior: accuracy = 0.685; AUC = 0.675; p < 0.001). Across all models, concurrent depressive symptoms, present/past diagnosis of depression, female sex at birth, cannabis use, visual/gustatory abnormalities, guilt, and lower role functioning were the most consistent correlates of SIB. Ideation was associated with lower disorganized communication expression and lower negative symptoms, whereas behaviors were associated with schizotypal personality disorder. Other core CHR-P symptoms, including Unusual Thoughts and Experiences, did not contribute to any model. ANCOVA (p < 0.001, partial η2 = 0.041) indicated increasing overall subthreshold psychotic symptoms across the SIB spectrum. CONCLUSION SIB in CHR-P individuals reflects a multidimensional clinical profile primarily outside of core psychosis-risk symptoms. TRIAL REGISTRATION ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT05905003.

Adolescent trajectories of psychotic-like experiences and autistic traits and their association with cognition, environmental adversity, and white matter microstructure in the ABCD Study.

BACKGROUND Psychotic-like experiences (PLEs) and autistic traits across development are associated with poor mental health outcomes. However, the relationship between PLEs and autistic traits, and their links with clinical and biological predictors of longitudinal outcomes, remain poorly understood. METHODS PLEs and autistic traits were measured across a three year period using the Prodromal Questionnaire Brief and Child Behavior Checklist in 9,963 adolescents from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study®. Separate Growth Mixture Models identified trajectories for PLEs and autistic traits. Associations between trajectories with longitudinal internalizing and externalizing symptoms, cognition, environmental adversity, and harmonized diffusion measures of baseline fractional anisotropy (FA), were examined. RESULTS Four trajectories were found for both PLEs and autistic traits: persistently low, persistently elevated, increasing, and decreasing. Persistently low trajectories were associated with favorable profiles across measures. Increasing or persistently elevated PLEs were associated with lower baseline FA, cognition, and socioeconomic disadvantage and linked to worsening internalizing symptoms and environmental adversity. Persistently elevated autistic traits were associated with lower cognition, more environmental adversity, and reduced FA. Overlapping trajectories of co-elevated or increasing PLEs and autistic traits conferred the highest risk, with impairments across measures. Compared to only-elevated autistic traits, only-elevated PLEs were associated with lower psychopathology, higher family conflict and life events, lower cognition, and specific white matter alterations. CONCLUSIONS Adolescents with distinct longitudinal PLEs and autistic traits trajectories differed on psychopathology, cognitive performance, environmental adversity, and white matter microstructure. Examining trajectory-specific differences highlights heterogeneity in early adolescent neurodevelopment and may support the advancement of early-detection strategies for at-risk youth.

The Coupled Stochastic Dynamical System: A Generative Model for Simulating and Forecasting Youth Mental Health Trajectories