IMPACT: Mechanisms Underlying Psychosis and Trauma
Research type
Research Study
Full title
IMPACT: Investigating the Mechanisms underlying Psychosis Associated with Childhood Trauma
IRAS ID
269253
Contact name
Michael A. P. Bloomfield
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University College London
Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier
Z6364106/2020/01/67, UCL Data protection Office
Duration of Study in the UK
5 years, 0 months, 1 days
Research summary
Psychosis is a severe illness involving feelings of fear, hearing voices, and having an altered perception of reality. There is growing evidence that developmental trauma - which are psychologically traumatic experiences in childhood and adolescence including physical, sexual and emotional abuse and neglect - increases the risk for psychosis later in adult life. We currently do not understand precisely how childhood trauma changes the way the brain works in order to cause psychosis. Thus far, studies have shown that developmental trauma can affect brain regions involved in specific functions including threat processing, reward processing, emotional regulation and executive function. These functions of the brain are also affected in individuals with psychosis, suggesting that developmental trauma may contribute to causing psychosis by altering these processes.
This study therefore seeks to investigate the hypothesis that individuals who have experienced developmental trauma will have altered performance in tasks which measure the above-mentioned brain functions, and that this underlies the link between developmental trauma and psychotic symptoms. The study will use questionnaires, behavioural tasks, clinical assessments and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to test our hypothesis in a 2 x 3 case control study: in healthy individuals with (H+DT) or without developmental trauma (H-DT), individuals with subclinical psychosis with (S+DT) or without (S-DT) developmental trauma, and patients with psychosis who have (P+DT) or have not (P-DT) experienced developmental trauma.
The proposed study has the potential to improve current understanding of the mechanisms underlying how trauma in childhood could contribute to causing psychosis. This in turn will assist in the development of targeted psychological and pharmacological interventions to reduce the risk of psychosis following trauma exposure and improve treatments for people with psychosis who have experienced trauma.
REC name
Yorkshire & The Humber - Bradford Leeds Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
22/YH/0096
Date of REC Opinion
7 Jun 2022
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion