Childhood maltreatment enhances behavioral flexibility in win-seeking contexts by lowering subjective environmental stability and blunts prefrontal representation of environmental change

Background: Childhood maltreatment significantly impacts future mental health, but the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Neurocognitive changes following maltreatment may constitute a latent vulnerability for psychopathology. While previous research shows that maltreatment alters threat and reward processing, its effects on learning and decision-making are poorly understood. We investigated how childhood maltreatment influences future learning and decision-making in volatile environments focused on win-seeking vs. loss-avoidance.Methods: Adolescents aged 12-17 with (n=59) and without (n=46) exposure to maltreatment completed a probabilistic reversal learning task with separate win- seeking and loss-avoidance conditions during fMRI. We employed computational modelling to assess latent learning processes. In addition to group differences, we explored effects of maltreatment type and psychiatric symptoms.Results: A belief-based Hidden Markov model showed that maltreatment-exposed individuals had lower estimates of environmental stability in the win-seeking, but not the loss-avoidance condition. Congruently, maltreated adolescents perseverated less and thus outperformed controls after reversals in the win-seeking condition. At the neural level, maltreated adolescents displayed lower right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex activation associated with environmental changes (upcoming reversals). In maltreated adolescents, lower stability estimates in the win condition were associated with more psychiatric symptoms and impaired performance during stable task phases. Predominant exposure to abuse was associated with altered win-seeking, while neglect was associated with altered loss-avoidance.