Depression is the leading cause of years lost due to disability worldwide. Still, the mechanisms underlying its development are not well understood. This study aimed to evaluate white-matter properties associated with depressive symptomatology in young adulthood and their developmental origins. Diffusion tensor imaging and assessment of depressive symptomatology were conducted in 128 young adults (47% male, age 23-24) from a prenatal birth cohort (European Longitudinal Study of Pregnancy and Childhood). For a subset of these individuals, the database included information on prenatal stress (n = 93) and depressive symptoms during adolescence (assessed repeatedly at age 15 and 19). Depressive symptoms in young adulthood were associated with lower fractional anisotropy in the left and right cingulum and higher fractional anisotropy in the right corticospinal tract and superior longitudinal fasciculus. Further analyses revealed that prenatal stress and depressive symptomatology during adolescence were independent predictors of altered white-matter properties in the cingulum in young adulthood. We conclude that typically developing young adults with more depressive symptoms already exhibit tract-specific alterations in white-matter properties and that prenatal stress and depressive symptomatology during adolescence might contribute to their development.

• Keywords
• adolescence, cohort studies, depression, diffusion tensor imaging, life stress, prenatal development, white matter,
• MeSH
• White Matter pathology   MeSH
• Depression etiology   pathology   MeSH
• Humans MeSH
• Longitudinal Studies MeSH
• Adolescent MeSH
• Young Adult MeSH
• Brain pathology   MeSH
• Psychological Distress MeSH
• Pregnancy MeSH
• Diffusion Tensor Imaging MeSH
• Prenatal Exposure Delayed Effects pathology   psychology   MeSH
• Check Tag
• Humans MeSH
• Adolescent MeSH
• Young Adult MeSH
• Male MeSH
• Pregnancy MeSH
• Female MeSH
• Publication type
• Journal Article MeSH
• Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't MeSH