This lesson contains the reference list for all research that informed the toolkit. Articles cover anhedonia, reward processing, dopamine, stress, resilience, and hope related brain activity.

Readers interested in methods, imaging findings, or treatment directions can start with these citations and follow the lines of research that feel most relevant.

Borsini, A., St John Wallis, A., Zunszain, P., Pariante, C. M., & Kempton, M. J. (2020). Characterizing anhedonia: A systematic review of neuroimaging across the subtypes of reward processing deficits in depression. Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience, 20(4), 816–841. https://doi.org/10.3758/s13415-020-00810-1

Hunter, R. G., Gray, J. D., & McEwen, B. S. (2018). The neuroscience of resilience. Journal of the Society for Social Work and Research, 9(2), 305–339. https://doi.org/10.1086/697956

Kong, F., Ma, X., You, X., & Xiang, Y. (2018). The resilient brain: Psychological resilience mediates the effect of amplitude of low-frequency fluctuations in orbitofrontal cortex on subjective well-being in young healthy adults. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 13(7), 755–763. https://doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsy045

Lynch, C. J., Elbau, I. G., Ng, T., Ayaz, A., Zhu, S., Wolk, D., ... Liston, C. (2024). Frontostriatal salience network expansion in individuals in depression. Nature, 633(8030), 624–633. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-07805-2

Meltzer-Brody, S., et al. (2025). Neurosteroids as emerging therapeutics for treatment-resistant depression. Neuropsychopharmacology.

McEwen, B. S., et al. (2023). The neurobiology of stress: Vulnerability, resilience, and hope. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 120, e2312662120. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2312662120

McCoy, K., Reed, F., Conn, K., & Foldi, C. J. (2025). Separate or inseparable? Serotonin and dopamine system interactions may underlie the therapeutic potential of psilocybin for anorexia nervosa. Physiology & Behavior, 298, 114957. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.physbeh.2025.114957

Sun, X., Jin, C., Cui, C., Chen, Z., & Dai, Q. (2025). Reward network mechanism in anhedonia and depression. PLOS ONE, 20(9), e0332816. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0332816

Takahashi, M., & Shelton, R. C. (2025). From trauma to depression: Structural, synaptic, epigenetic, and molecular pathways linking early stress to lifelong vulnerability. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 16, 1666599. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2025.1666599

Treadway, M. T., & Zald, D. H. (2008). Anhedonia in depression: Biological mechanisms and assessment. Biological Psychiatry, 64(7), 738–748. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsych.2008.04.019

Wang, S., Xu, X., Zhou, M., Chen, T., Yang, X., Chen, G., & Gong, Q. (2017). Hope and the brain: Trait hope mediates the protective role of medial orbitofrontal cortex spontaneous activity against anxiety. NeuroImage, 157, 439–447. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2017.05.056

Xia, F., Kheirbek, M. A., et al. (2024). Understanding the neural code of stress to control anhedonia. Nature, 636, 47–55. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-024-08241-y