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. 2022:58:43-60.
doi: 10.1007/7854_2022_356.

Origins of Anhedonia in Childhood and Adolescence

Janani Prabhakar  1 , Dylan M Nielson  2   3 , Argyris Stringaris  4   5
Affiliations

Origins of Anhedonia in Childhood and Adolescence

Janani Prabhakar et al. Curr Top Behav Neurosci. 2022.

Abstract

Anhedonia reflects a reduced ability to engage in previously pleasurable activities and has been reported in children as young as 3 years of age. It manifests early and is a strong predictor of psychiatric disease onset and progression over the course of development and into adulthood. However, little is known about its mechanistic origins, particularly in childhood and adolescence. In this chapter, we provide a socio-cognitive model of the development of anhedonia. This model is substantiated by past literature presented in this chapter to account for how the individual trajectories of emotion knowledge, autobiographical memory, and self-concept representations contribute to the onset, persistence, and progression of anhedonia from early childhood through adolescence.

Keywords: Emotion knowledge; Episodic memory; Self-concept development.

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Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
This figure represents a graphical depiction of the socioemotional hypothesis of anhedonia proposed in this manuscript. Individuals strive to select choices from what is possible (yellow circle) that cohere with their self-concept beliefs (red circle). The length of the lines in these figures reflects the degree of discordance one might feel when their choice or choices are not consistent with their self-concept beliefs. As such, an ideal place is when the distance between one’s self-concept beliefs and set of possible choices is not exceedingly distant (a). When choices begin to diverge from one’s set of beliefs and the distance between them begins to increase (b), the discrepancy may generate feelings of discomfort and unease. To reduce this distance, one needs to either alter their set of beliefs to overlap with the choice that was made or select options that are more in line with one’s self-beliefs
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