PROJECT SUMMARY Adolescents with a family history of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are at heightened risk for depression and other mental health problems related to poor emotion regulation (ER). Parents play a crucial role in adolescents’ development of ER skills, and parenting practices are related to the structure and function of adolescent brain regions underlying emotion reactivity and regulation. Parenting has yet to be utilized, however, to directly modulate adolescent ER neurocircuitry in order to promote adaptive ER development. The proposed study will test the efficacy of a real-time fMRI dyadic neurofeedback (DNF) protocol to promote healthy ER-related neurodevelopment in female adolescents with a maternal history of ACEs. The proposed study will use DNF to provide neurofeedback from the adolescent’s anterior insular cortex (aIC) to the adolescent’s mother as the mother and adolescent engage in an emotion discussion task together. Parents and adolescents (n=35 active DNF; n=35 control) will communicate via microphones and noise-canceling headphones while the adolescent is undergoing fMRI scanning. Specific aims of the current study are to determine: 1) the effects of aIC DNF on the developing ER network in adolescents with a history of maternal ACEs, 2) associations between parenting practices during DNF and reduced adolescent aIC activation, and 3) longitudinal effects of aIC DNF on adolescent internalizing symptoms. This study is significant because engaging with parents in DNF can promote positive ER development in at-risk adolescents. Adolescence is a sensitive period for the development of ER, and adaptive changes in neurocircuitry and the parent-adolescent relationship could promote resilience to later mental health problems. This study is innovative in that DNF is a novel neurobehavioral approach with the potential to simultaneously affect both parenting behavior and adolescent neurobiology. The study employs an experimental paradigm with naturalistic aspects that are often lacking in fMRI studies, thus increasing the generalizability of DNF effects outside the scanner. The overall impact of the proposed study will be the evaluation of a novel neurobehavioral approach to the promotion of adaptive ER skills in adolescents that can inform future prevention and intervention efforts for psychiatric disorders, including cost effective and community-based applications, aimed at preventing the intergenerational effects of ACEs on mental health.