Publications authored by the Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics are listed below. This is a partial listing pulled from PubMed.gov and contains only a sample of published articles. To see a complete list of all publications by VIPBG, use alt + click on the pubmedvcu link below.
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- Effects of family genetic risk scores and environmental factors on risk of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder July 3, 2026Both genetic and environmental risk factors contribute to the development of schizophrenia (SCZ) and bipolar disorder (BD), but simultaneous investigation of how these factors influence risk has not yet been comprehensively examined in a large population. Therefore, we aimed to investigate and quantify how a multi-generational index of aggregated genetic risk (family genetic risk scores, […]Natassia Robinson
- Predictors of Mental Healthcare Need and Utilisation Among Asian American Adolescents With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities July 2, 2026CONCLUSION: Adolescents with I/DD in the United States experience racial/ethnic disparities in mental healthcare. The findings from this suggest the need to investigate further into the intersection of race/ethnicity and I/DD in mental healthcare and the creation of policies that promote equitable access to mental healthcare services for adolescents with I/DD, especially for minority individuals.Kayla K Van
- Can We Improve the Prediction of Early Onset Mania and Hypomania in the Community? June 26, 2026CONCLUSIONS: Improving the accurate prediction of BD onset would benefit from greater consensus regarding the operationalisation of known risk attributes and selection of analytic models that consider sample imbalances.Jan Scott
- Co-expression-based models improve eQTL predictions for transcriptome-wide association studies and highlight new schizophrenia-associated genes June 22, 2026Most genetic variants associated with complex heritability phenotypes lie in non-coding regions and are thought to influence disease risk by regulating gene expression. However, most transcriptome-wide association approaches primarily model local (cis) genetic effects, leaving much of gene regulation unexplained. Here, we show that incorporating distal (trans) regulatory effects improves the prediction of gene expression […]Fabiana Rossi
- High Prevalence of Suicidal Behavior in Severe Alcohol Use Disorder Linked to Specific Neurocognitive Deficits: The Cognition, Alcohol, Genes, and Environment Study June 19, 2026CONCLUSIONS: These preliminary findings open research avenues to study the mechanisms related to the co-occurrence of AUD and STB, with the hope of reducing STB risk in this population.Séverine Lannoy
- Leveraging Family Genetic Risk Scores to Understand the Etiology of Suicidal Behaviors and Their Associations With Psychiatric Disorders June 19, 2026CONCLUSIONS: Though psychiatric disorders were associated with increased risk of SA/SD, a substantial proportion of suicidal behaviors occurred outside the context of psychiatric disorders, urging the development of screening and prevention in non-psychiatric populations. Despite their low genetic liability for SA/SD, findings suggest that the effect of genetic risk on SA/SD risk is stronger in […]Séverine Lannoy
- Changes in Genetic Contributions to ASD and ADHD by Year of Diagnosis June 10, 2026CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: By analyzing multiple polygenic scores together with simulated expectations, this study could disambiguate among competing hypotheses about scenarios that may be associated with increased rates of ADHD and ASD diagnoses. Findings support broadening diagnostic criteria as an explanation for increasing rates, with implications for understanding changes in risk factors and clinical practice.Sonja LaBianca
- Predicting Functional Changes in Down Syndrome During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Role of Biopsychosocial Determinants of Health June 4, 2026CONCLUSIONS: Mental health and healthcare access barriers were biopsychosocial correlates of functional changes for people with DS during COVID-19.Ester Jo
- Social Media Usage and Its Association With the Social Media Addiction Questionnaire Scale Among Early Adolescents June 1, 2026CONCLUSION: Higher SMA scores were most associated with TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat use as well as using a public account, a secret account, and spending more time on social media. The relationship between social media hours and SMA confirms previous findings. This is the first study to investigate the relationship between account settings and SMA.Jacob C Hermann
- Shared genetic risk between functional somatic syndromes, internalizing disorders, and immune-mediated diseases: a twin-sibling study May 26, 2026Functional somatic syndromes frequently co-occur with internalizing disorders such as anxiety disorders and major depressive disorder. Both show familial associations with immune-mediated diseases. Here, we estimate genetic and environmental contributions to functional somatic syndromes and their overlap with immune-mediated diseases, with internalizing disorders included for comparison. The study sample consisted of 6,097,372 Swedish twins, full […]Olivier D Steen
- Structure of the Genetic Risks for Psychiatric Disorders in Swedish Population-Based Registries May 20, 2026CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: Using a complete epidemiological ascertainment frame for treated psychiatric disorders in a large population sample with high-quality registries, this cohort study uncovered a structure of genetic risks that, compared to prior efforts, was similar in many ways but also had important differences.Kenneth S Kendler
- The typology of common psychiatric disorders as depicted by genetic maps: a study based on Swedish population-based registers May 15, 2026We sought to clarify the inter-relationships among a range of psychiatric and substance use disorders by employing two-dimensional genetic maps, with axes defined by family genetic risk for major depression (MD) and drug use disorder (DUD). Using comprehensive Swedish national register data, we located cases of 12 disorders within this space and examined how their […]Kenneth S Kendler
- Evaluating GPT-4o for Automated Classification of Skin Lesions Using the HAM10000 Dataset May 15, 2026No abstractNitin Chetla
- A Global Prospective Harmonization Framework for Suicidality, Anhedonia, and Obsessive-Compulsive Symptoms in Psychiatric Genetic Studies: A Cross-Continental Study Within the Ancestral Population Network May 11, 2026This study aims to prospectively collect harmonized, quantitative, and dimensional psychiatric phenotypes (suicidality, anhedonia, and obsessive-compulsive symptoms) and information on discrimination, stigma, and unfair treatment in up to 27,500 individuals across diverse ancestries and clinical populations for genetic analysis within the NIMH Ancestral Population Network (APN). Five APN projects are participating in the current study […]Ana M Diaz-Zuluaga
- Predicting the geographical distribution of drug use disorder in Sweden from the geographical variation in social deprivation, genetic risk and urbanization May 11, 2026Drug use disorder (DUD) is distributed unevenly over geographical areas of Sweden. We explore, using geographically weighted regression, the proportion of this variation associated with community levels of genetic risk, social deprivation and urbanicity. In the 5983 Demographic Statistical areas (DeSOs) within Sweden, we predict DeSO prevalence from mean genetic risk for DUD, measured by […]Kenneth S Kendler
- Neuron-Enriched Extracellular Vesicle MicroRNAs Reflect Hormone-Sensitive Neural Pathway Changes from Early to Late Perimenopause May 7, 2026The menopausal transition represents a major neuroendocrine shift marked by declining estradiol and progesterone, rising follicle-stimulating hormone, and increased vulnerability to cognitive and affective symptoms. Despite extensive evidence of hormone-related neural changes, few biomarkers directly index hormone-sensitive neuronal adaptations in vivo. Neuron-enriched extracellular vesicles (nEVs) isolated from blood provide a minimally invasive window into central […]Rebekah L Frye
- Adolescent music engagement is associated with less alcohol consumption and substance experimentation 5-11 years later: A genetically informative study May 7, 2026CONCLUSIONS: Music engagement is associated with reduced substance use in adolescence and young adulthood, driven by protective shared environmental influences rather than direct effects. Music engagement may represent a constructive environmental outlet for youth, underscoring the importance of genetically informed research. However, the results may not generalize to more contemporary and/or diverse cohorts. (PsycInfo Database […]Lydia Rader
- Indirect Genetic Effects on Alcohol Use Disorder and Nicotine Dependence May 1, 2026Substance use disorders run in families, yet the mechanisms underlying intergenerational transmission remain unclear. We investigated indirect genetic effects, pathways through which parental genotypes influence offspring phenotypes via the family environment, for alcohol use disorder (AUD), nicotine dependence (ND), and related quantitative outcomes, and aimed to identify family environmental factors through which such effects may […]Mannan Luo
- Subjective Sleep Traits and Cognition Across Mid- to Late-Adulthood: A Cross-Sectional Study of Gene-Environment Interplay April 30, 2026Genetic susceptibility to Alzheimer's disease (ad) may influence the extent to which environmental factors shape cognition, with individuals at higher genetic risk potentially exhibiting greater sensitivity to environmental exposures. Sleep, an important factor for both cognitive function and ad risk, may further moderate genetic influences (A), including both measured (AP) and latent (AL) components, as […]Tina T Vo-Eckerle
- The protective effect of pregnancy on risk for suicide attempt in a Swedish national cohort April 22, 2026We used national Swedish registry data to investigate the nature of the association between pregnancy and decreased risk for suicide attempt (SA). Analyses included pregnant individuals aged 18-35, biological fathers, and matched controls born 1975-1995. Data were available for between 366,125 and 2,129,244 females (depending on the model) and 359,622 males. We evaluated risk for […]Mallory Stephenson
