James Edward Swain M.D., Ph.D., F.R.C.P.S.

Assistant Professor of Child Psychiatry, Child Study Center

Research Interests

I am a clinician-scientist with a background doctorate in the basic neuroscience of brain cell communication at the molecular level. I went on to complete clinical training as a physician, general psychiatrist and the child and adolescent psychiatry subspecialty. Over the last year, I have been fortunate to develop projects that combine multiple techniques to understand human thoughts and behaviors in mental health and illness, including functional brain imaging. Thus, my scholarly interests range from the brain-basis and psychology of social bonding across development and through evolution.

Our group is interested in the cognitive neuroscience that underlies the risk, resilience and recovery associated with mental health issues. In particular, we are interested in the thoughts, behaviors and brain physiology involved in human attachment. One example of human bonding that we are focusing on is the parent-infant bond. Over the last few years, we have accumulated an extensive database on parents in the early postpartum, which includes interviews, self-reports, video assessments, and brain imaging. We have been conducting functional magnetic resonance imaging while parents attend to emotionally charged baby stimuli. We are beginning to describe the ways that key emotion-regulation brain circuits are activated in parents’ brains by baby stimuli in ways that correlate with parenting thoughts and behaviors in healthy parents as well as vulnerable groups such as parents with postpartum depression and anxiety. We are also investigating the relationship between the activity of key brain circuits and infant development.

I have particular clinical expertise and interest in the assessment, classification and treatment of mental health issues in children and families. In addition, I am interested in aspects of obsessive compulsive disorder, Tourette's disorder and related mood and anxiety disorders across the lifespan from infancy to adulthood – especially insofar as they influence social behaviors.

Curriculum Vitae

• COS profile

Recent Publications

• Swain JE, Leckman JF, Mayes LC, Feldman R, Hoyt E, Kang H, Kim P, Constable RT, Schultz RT (2007) Parents Have Specific Brain Activations in Response to Own Baby Cry, Submitted
• Shulman S, Mayes LC, Cohen T, Swain JE, Leckman JF (2007) The Interplay between Love Relationships and Attraction among Late Adolescent and Early Adult Romantic Couples and Its Change Over-Time, Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, Submitted
• Swain JE, Lombroso PJ, Scahill, LD, King RA, Leckman, JF (2007) Tourette's Syndrome and Tic Disorders: Ten Years of Progress, Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, In Press
• Swain, JE, Lorberbaum JP, Kose S, Strathearn L (2007) The Brain Basis of Early Parenthood: Psychology and in vivo Functional Neuroimaging Studies, Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, In Press
• Swain JE (2007) Critical Developmental Periods of Increased Plasticity Program Ritualized Behavior, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, In Press
• Swain JE (2006) Epigenetic Effects of Child Abuse and Neglect Propagate Human Cruelty, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, In Press
• Feygin D, Swain JE, Leckman, JF: The Normalcy of Neurosis: Evolutionary Origins of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and Related Behaviors, Progress in Neuro-Psychopharmacology & Biological Psychiatry 2006;5, 854-864
• Swain JE, Leckman JF, Mayes LC, Feldman R, Schultz RT: Own baby pictures induce parental brain activations according to psychology, experience and postpartum timing, Biological Psychiatry 2006;59(8):126S
• Mayes LC, Swain JE, Leckman JF: Parental Attachment Systems: Neural Circuits, Genes, and Experiential, Clinical Neuroscience Research 2005;4, 301-313
• Koszycki D, Torres, S, Swain, JE, Bradwejn, J Central Cholecystokinin Activity in Irritable Bowel, Psychosomatic Medicine 2005;67:590-595
• Swain, JE, Mayes, LC, Leckman, JF: Endogenous and Exogenous Opiates Modulate the Development of Parent-Infant Attachment, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 2005;28(3):367-368
• Swain JD, Swain JE: “To do or not to do?” Modeling the control of behavior, Behavioral and Brain Science 2005;28(5):662-663
• Feldman R, Swain JE, Mayes JE: Interaction Synchrony and Neural Circuits Contribute to Shared Intentionality, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 2005;28(5):697-698
• Swain JE, Leckman, JF, Volkmar, FR (2005) The Wolf-Boy: A Case of Reactive Attachment Disorder in an Adolescent Boy, Psychiatry 2005 2005;2(11):55-61
• Leckman, JF, Feldman, R, Swain, JE, Eicher, VE, Thompson, N, Mayes, LC: Primary Parental Preoccupation:, Journal of Neural Transmission 2004;111:753-771
• Swain, JE, Mayes, LC, Leckman, JF: The Development of Parent-Infant Attachment through Dynamic and, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 2004;27(4):472-473

Grants/Contracts

I am the privileged to be author or co-author of articles on Tourette’s disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and parent-infant bonding. In addition, I am proud to be an investigator on funded grants from the Tourette Syndrome Association (TSA), and National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression (NARSAD).

Collaborators

Yale Child Study Center
James F. Leckman MD
Linda C. Mayes MD
Robert T. Schultz MD
Michael J. Crowley PhD
Michael H. Block MD Kyle Pruett MD

Yale Department of Psychiatry
Joan Kaufman MD
Cynthia Neil Epperson MD

Yale Department of Psychology
Alan E. Kazdin PhD
Julia Kim-Cohen PhD

Bar Illan University
Ruth Feldman PhD

University of Toronto
Henry J. Moller MD

Contact

Campus Address
Child Study Center
230 South Frontage Road
P.O. Box 207900
New Haven, CT 06520-7900

Office Address
NIHB205

E-mail
james.swain@yale.edu

Office Phone
203-785-6973

Fax
203-785-7611