Associations between Depression-Relevant Genetic Risk and Youth Stress Exposure: Evidence of Gene-Environment Correlations

• Authors: Cope Feurer, Department of Psychiatry, University of Illinois at Chicago; John E McGeary, Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University; Leslie Brick, Emory University; Valerie S Knopik, Department of Human Development & Family Studies, Purdue University; Matthew M Carper, Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University; Rohan Palmer, Emory University; Brandon E Gibb, Department of Psychology, Binghamton University (SUNY)
• Journal Title: Journal of Psychopathology and Clinical Science
• Volume: Volume 131, Number 5
• Publisher: APA PsycNet | 2022-07-01, Pages 457-466
• Type of Work: Article | Post-print: After Peer Review
• Publisher DOI: http://doi.org/10.1037/abn0000757
• Subjects: Health Sciences, Human Development; Psychology, Behavioral
• Keywords: polygenic risk score; rGE; depression; stress exposure

Abstract

Familial risk for depression is associated with youth exposure to self-generated dependent stressful life events and independent events that are out of youth’s control. Familial risk includes both genetic and environmental influences, raising the question of whether genetic influences, specifically, are associated with youth exposure to both dependent and independent stressful life events. To address this question, this study examined the relation between a genome-wide association study (GWAS)-derived depression-based polygenic risk score (DEP-PRS) and youth experiences of dependent and independent stress. Participants were 180 youth (ages 8–14, 52.2% female) of European ancestry and their biological mothers recruited based on the presence versus absence of a history of major depressive disorder (MDD) in the mothers. Youth and mothers were interviewed every 6 months for 2 years regarding the occurrence of stressful life events, which were coded as independent or dependent (self-generated). Results indicated that youth’s DEP-PRS and maternal history of MDD were uniquely associated with increased exposure to both dependent and independent events. Similar results were observed when examining major versus minor events separately, with the additional finding of a DEP-PRS × mother MDD interaction for major dependent events such that levels of moderate to severe dependent life stressors were highest among youth with high DEP-PRSs who also had mothers with MDD. These results not only support the presence of depression-relevant gene-environment correlations (rGEs), but also highlight the possibility that rather than only capturing depression-specific genetic liability, GWAS-derived polygenic risk scores may also capture genetic variance contributing to stress exposure.