Losing Control: Prefrontal Emotion Regulation Is Related to Symptom Severity and Predicts Treatment-Related Symptom Change in Adolescent Girls With Conduct Disorder

Emotion regulation skills are linked to corticolimbic brain activity (e.g., dorsolateral prefrontal cortex [dlPFC] and limbic regions) and enable an individual to control their emotional experiences, thus allowing healthy social functioning. Disruptions in emotion regulation skills are reported in neuropsychiatric disorders, including conduct disorder or oppositional defiant disorder (CD/ODD). Clinically recognized means to ameliorate emotion regulation deficits observed in CD/ODD include cognitive or dialectical behavioral skills therapy as implemented in the START NOW program. However, the role of emotion regulation and its neural substrates in symptom severity and prognosis following treatment of adolescent CD/ODD has not been investigated.