# Traumatic Brain Injury, Mental Health Functioning, and Substance Misuse Among Youth from the ABCD Cohort.

> **NIH NIH F31** · UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO · 2024 · $44,401

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT
Adolescence is when many individuals begin to seek increased levels of autonomy from their families and
experience pubertal-related brain changes, often leading to increased reward seeking and subsequent risk-
taking behaviors. Risky behaviors can lead to injuries, such as traumatic brain injuries (TBIs), which in
adolescents and young adults account for a large portion of emergency room visits. TBIs can impact normative
brain development and put adolescents at elevated risk for increased mental health symptoms, such as
anxiety, depression, and addiction. In fact, peak substance use often occurs during the adolescent period of
development, (i.e., alcohol, nicotine, and cannabis) and TBIs may further increase this risk for substance
misuse through damage to impulse control regions of the brain, such as the frontal lobe. Personality factors
such as impulsivity may also predispose some adolescents to engage in more behaviors that culminate in TBIs
and increase risk for poorer health outcomes. However, little is known about the prospective relationships
between TBI history, mental health functioning, and substance misuse among individuals as young as 9-14
years of age. Therefore, this project will use data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD)
Study cohort to examine how mental health symptoms might mediate the association between TBI and
substance misuse behaviors and how trait impulsivity might moderate this association. These associations will
be examined longitudinally where TBI, mental health symptoms, and substance misuse will be examined at
baseline (ages 9-10), year 2 (ages 11-12), and year 4 (ages 13-14) using a cross-lagged panel mediation
model with baseline impulsivity as a moderator. The results from this project will inform behavioral challenges,
prevention strategies, and functional targets for intervention development for adolescents with history TBI.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10998840
- **Project number:** 1F31DA061618-01
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO
- **Principal Investigator:** Everett Lee Delfel
- **Activity code:** F31 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $44,401
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2024-09-01 → 2028-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10998840

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10998840, Traumatic Brain Injury, Mental Health Functioning, and Substance Misuse Among Youth from the ABCD Cohort. (1F31DA061618-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10998840. Licensed CC0.

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