Research
The research backbone of the UB approach.
Universal Brain's approach is grounded in decades of peer-reviewed ERP research. This page collects that published evidence — how event-related potentials relate to the aid in diagnosis, onset, course, and treatment of depression.
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The evidence base for ERP biomarkers in depression.
This page summarises the peer-reviewed research behind Universal Brain's approach. Findings are organised by what event-related potentials have been shown to relate to in depression — the aid in diagnosis, onset, course and response to treatment — and tagged by the cognitive construct it measures. Universal Brain combines multiple ERPs, an approach it calls neurotyping, to build on this evidence base.
All findings
Every published finding below, spanning the aid in diagnosis, onset, course and treatment of depression.
2026DOI ↗
Electrocortical reactivity during self-referential processing in current and remitted depression.
Simon JR, et al. · International Journal of Psychophysiology, 223, 113365
Emotion
2025DOI ↗
Systematic review and meta-analysis: impact of unipolar depression on P300 amplitude and latency.
Santopetro NJ, et al. · Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews
Attention
2025DOI ↗
Childhood P300 predicts development of depressive disorders into adolescence.
Santopetro NJ, Nelson BD, Hajcak G, Klein DN · Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience
Attention
2025DOI ↗
Neurotyping depression using multiple ERPs: leveraging task-based variation to predict remission in depression.
Hajcak G, Santopetro N, Okuda K · Prog. Neuropsychopharmacology & Biological Psychiatry, 136, 111233
AttentionRewardEmotion
2025DOI ↗
Association between early childhood P300 deficits and risk for preadolescence depressive disorder, mediated by responsiveness to PCIT-ED treatment.
Santopetro NJ, et al. · Research on Child and Adolescent Psychopathology, 53, 877–890
Attention
2024DOI ↗
Electrocortical reactivity during self-referential processing predicts the development of depression across adolescence.
Barkley SB, Hajcak G, Nelson BD · Biol. Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience & Neuroimaging, 9(9), 958–965
Emotion
2023DOI ↗
Longitudinal associations between reward responsiveness and depression across adolescence.
Mackin DM, et al. · J. Am. Acad. Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 62(7), 816–828
Reward
2023DOI ↗
Cumulative lifetime stress exposure interacts with reward responsiveness to predict longitudinal increases in depression severity in adolescence.
Burani K, et al. · Psychological Medicine, 53(10), 4507–4516
Reward
2023DOI ↗
Neural predictors of improvement with cognitive behavioral therapy for adolescents with depression: reward responsiveness and emotion regulation.
Dickey L, et al. · Research on Child and Adolescent Psychopathology, 51, 1069–1082
RewardEmotion
2022DOI ↗
Reduced P300 amplitude is consistently associated with trait anhedonia across repeated assessments.
Santopetro NJ, Mulligan EM, Brush CJ, Hajcak G · Psychophysiology, 59(12), e14127
Attention
2022DOI ↗
Reduced electrocortical responses to pleasant pictures in depression: time-domain and time-frequency delta analyses.
Dell’Acqua C, et al. · Biological Psychology, 170, 108302
Emotion
2022DOI ↗
The P300 and late positive potential in pregnancy prospectively predict increases in depressive and anxious symptoms in the early postpartum period.
Mulligan EM, et al. · Journal of Affective Disorders, 317, 193–203
AttentionEmotion
2021DOI ↗
A reduced P300 prospectively predicts increased depressive severity in adults with clinical depression.
Santopetro NJ, Brush CJ, Bruchnak A, Klawohn J, Hajcak G · Psychophysiology, 58(4), e13767
Attention
2021DOI ↗
Neural responses to reward and pleasant pictures prospectively predict remission from depression.
Klawohn J, Brush CJ, Hajcak G · Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 130(7), 702–712
RewardEmotion
2020DOI ↗
Reduced P300 in depression: evidence from a flanker task and impact on ERN, CRN, and Pe.
Klawohn J, Santopetro N, Meyer A, Hajcak G · Psychophysiology, 57(4), e13520
Attention
2020DOI ↗
Reduced neural response to reward and pleasant pictures independently relate to depression.
Klawohn J, Burani K, Bruchnak A, Santopetro N, Hajcak G · Psychological Medicine, 51(5), 741–749
RewardEmotion
2020DOI ↗
Reduced flanker P300 prospectively predicts increases in depression in female adolescents.
Santopetro N, Kallen AM, Threadgill AH, Hajcak G · Biological Psychology, 156, 107967
Attention
2020DOI ↗
Stressful life events moderate the effect of neural reward responsiveness in childhood on depressive symptoms in adolescence.
Goldstein BL, et al. · Psychological Medicine, 50(9), 1548–1555
Reward
2020DOI ↗
Neural indicators of anhedonia: predictors and mechanisms of treatment change in a randomized clinical trial in early childhood depression.
Barch DM, Whalen D, Gilbert K, Kelly D, Kappenman ES, Hajcak G, Luby JL · Biological Psychiatry, 88(11), 879–887
RewardEmotion
2018DOI ↗
Time-frequency reward-related delta prospectively predicts adolescent-onset depression.
Nelson BD, Infantolino ZP, Klein DN, Perlman G, Kotov R, Hajcak G · Biol. Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience & Neuroimaging, 3(1), 41–49
Reward
2016DOI ↗
Blunted neural response to rewards as a prospective predictor of the development of depression in adolescent girls.
Nelson BD, Perlman G, Klein DN, Kotov R, Hajcak G · American Journal of Psychiatry, 173(12), 1223–1230
Reward
2016DOI ↗
Neural reactivity to reward as a predictor of cognitive behavioral therapy response in anxiety and depression.
Burkhouse KL, et al. · Depression and Anxiety, 33(4), 281–288
Reward
2012DOI ↗
Neurophysiological predictors of non-response to rTMS in depression.
Arns M, Drinkenburg WH, Fitzgerald PB, Kenemans JL · Brain Stimulation, 5(4), 569–576
Attention
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