Linking brain maturation and puberty during early adolescence using longitudinal brain age prediction in the ABCD cohort

AbstractThe temporal characteristics of brain maturation could potentially represent a mediating effect between pubertal development and life outcomes. Using a large longitudinal dataset of children aged 9-12 from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study we tested the associations between pubertal status and brain maturation. Brain maturation was assessed using brain age prediction with a deep learning approach based on convolutional neural networks and minimally processed T1-weighted structural MRI data. Brain age prediction provided highly accurate and reliable estimates of individual age, with an overall mean absolute error of 0.7 and 1.4 years at the two timepoints respectively, and an intraclass correlation of 0.65. Linear mixed effects (LME) models accounting for age and sex showed that on average, advancing pubertal development by one pubertal stage was associated with a 2.4 months higher brain age across time points (β= 0.10, p<.001). Further, significant interactions with time demonstrated that higher rates of pubertal development were associated with larger positive changes in brain age over time (p<.001). These results demonstrate a link between sexual development and brain maturation in early adolescence, and provides a basis for further investigations of the complex sociobiological impacts of puberty on the adolescent brain and mind.