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Browsing by Author "Riggs, Nathan, committee member"

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    Educational attainment polygenic scores, socioeconomic factors, and resting-state functional connectivity in children and adolescents
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2024) Hansen, Melissa, author; Merz, Emily, advisor; Thomas, Michael, committee member; Seger, Carol, committee member; Riggs, Nathan, committee member
    Socioeconomic factors, such as family income and parental education, have been associated with resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) in networks responsible for executive function in children and adolescents. Yet, children's socioeconomic context interacts with the genetics they inherit from their parents, and few studies of socioeconomic context and rsFC in children have considered genetics. Polygenic scores for educational attainment (PGS-EA) derived from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) reflect genetic predisposition to educational attainment. Yet, no studies have examined the associations between PGS-EA and rsFC. The goal of this study was to investigate how socioeconomic factors and PGS-EA jointly predict rsFC in neural networks associated with executive function, including the central executive (CEN), dorsal attention (DAN), salience (SN), and default mode networks (DMN) in children and adolescents. Participants are typically-developing 3- to 21-year-olds (N = 245, 51% female) from the previously-collected Pediatric Imaging, Neurocognition, and Genetics (PING) study. PGS-EA were computed based on the EA3 GWAS of educational attainment. Resting- state fMRI data were acquired, and system-level rsFC was computed. Findings indicated that family income was inversely associated with rsFC in the SN, while PGS-EA was positively associated with rsFC in the CEN. There were family income-by-age interactions for rsFC in the CEN and DAN, such that age was positively associated with rsFC in the CEN and DAN for children from higher income families and inversely associated with rsFC in the CEN for children from lower income families. These findings help to elucidate the independent genetic and socioeconomic contributions to connectivity in intrinsic functional neural networks underlying executive function.
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    Mindfulness and eating behavior in adolescent girls at risk for developing type 2 diabetes
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2017) Annameier, Shelly K., author; Shomaker, Lauren B., advisor; Riggs, Nathan, committee member; Stallones, Lorann, committee member
    Mindfulness interventions to address disinhibited eating have increased in popularity. Yet, there is surprisingly limited research explicitly describing the relationship of mindfulness with disinhibited eating, particularly in adolescents. In theory, mindfulness may be inversely related to disinhibited eating because present-moment attention promotes an individual's ability to recognize and respond effectively to internal hunger and fullness cues, as well as to differentiate between physiological hunger signals and other internal or external stimuli for eating. The primary goal of this study was to evaluate the relationship of dispositional mindfulness to eating in the absence of hunger (EAH) in adolescent girls at risk for type 2 diabetes (T2D). The secondary objective was to evaluate the interactions among mindfulness, hunger state, and a propensity for loss-of-control eating (LOC) in the prediction of eating behaviors, both with and without hunger. Participants were 107 adolescent girls (12-17 years) from diverse racial/ethnic backgrounds. Adolescents self-reported dispositional mindfulness, were evaluated for LOC by validated interview, and participated in two successive, standardized laboratory test meals to assess eating when hungry from a buffet lunch and EAH from a snack array. Adolescents rated state appetite before and after the meal and snacks. In analyses adjusting for age (years), race/ethnicity, body composition (percent body fat, lean mass, and height), and depressive symptoms, mindfulness was inversely related to EAH. Accounting for similar covariates, meal energy intake was not affected by mindfulness, but instead was predicted by a significant interaction of state hunger by LOC. Girls with LOC and high hunger ate the most as compared to girls with LOC and lower hunger or to girls without LOC. Results from the current study suggest that mindfulness may play a role in more effective regulation of food intake in girls at-risk for T2D; however, a propensity for LOC eating may be particularly salient for overeating in a state of high hunger.
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    The association between parental marijuana use and mother-child interactions
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2016) Barmore, Bryer, author; Lunkenheimer, Erika, advisor; Riggs, Nathan, committee member; Conner, Bradley, committee member
    Little is known about parents who use marijuana even though it is the most commonly used illicit substance in the world (Cooper & Haney, 2014). Previous research has shown negative outcomes for children of parents who use illicit substances (Kelley, Lawrence, Milletich, Hollis, & Henson, 2015; Riggs, Chou, & Pentz, 2009). Regular marijuana use has been linked to overall poorer mental health, and parents with poor mental health has been linked to maladaptive outcomes for their children later in life (Arseneault et al., 2002; Van Loon et al., 2014). Dynamic systems theory was used to quantify mother-child dyadic interaction patterns, with a specific focus on adaptive flexibility, negativity, and rigidity. Higher levels of flexibility has been shown to moderate the transmission of risk from parent to child (Granic & Lamey, 2002). This was a longitudinal study at two time points using a non-randomized community sample and focused on associational differences in mother-child dyads based on lifetime frequency of parental marijuana use. Mothers who had a higher frequency of marijuana use had reduced levels of dyadic adaptive flexibility, even after controlling for maternal depressive symptoms and mother's race. When fathers had a higher frequency of marijuana use, mother-child dyads had increased rigidity, however, after controlling for maternal depressive symptoms and mother's race, the association became insignificant.