Even mother's mild depressive symptoms affect the child's emotional well-being
September 23, 2019
Science Daily/National Institute for Health and Welfare
Even mild long-term depressive symptoms among mothers are connected with emotional problems among small children such as hyperactivity, aggressiveness and anxiet
According to recent research, even mild long-term depressive symptoms among mothers are connected with emotional problems among small children such as hyperactivity, aggressiveness and anxiety.
The study investigated how the depressive symptoms of both parents affected the child by the age of two and five.
The father's depressive symptoms affected the child's emotional problems only if the mother was depressed as well. The mother's symptoms, however, affected the child even if the father was not depressed.
Moderate depressive symptoms can be observed in over 20% of parents in Finland. Most serious symptoms are seen in less than 9% of mothers and around 2.5% of fathers.
"Depression among parents both during and after pregnancy not only affects the person suffering from depression but also has a long-term impact on the well-being of the newborn child. Even in cases of mild depression, it is important that the symptoms are identified and the parents are offered support as early as possible, if necessary already during the pregnancy," explains Visiting Researcher Johanna Pietikäinen from the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL).
"In families, depression experienced by the mother has a key impact on the child's well-being. In Finland, the maternity clinic system functions well, but attention should be paid to depressive symptoms among mothers over a longer period: from the pregnancy through to the end of the child's first year of age," she adds.
One parent's depression also puts the other at risk
The depression of one parent is a factor that can put the other parent at risk of depression as well. In addition, depressive symptoms among mothers and fathers are quite long-term: they can start already during pregnancy and continue past the child's first birthday.
"It is important to monitor the mental well-being of both parents during pregnancy and after the birth of the child, and if one parent shows symptoms of depression then the symptoms of the other parent should also be examined. Currently, however, fathers' psychological well-being is not necessarily covered by depression questionnaires in maternity clinics, for example," Pietikäinen points out.
Prior depression is the most significant risk factor
Long-term depression is an indication that the depression may have been experienced already before the pregnancy. Previous experience of depression was, in fact, one of the key risk factors for moderate or severe depressive symptoms.
Other significant risk factors included sleep deprivation during pregnancy, stress, anxiety and a bad family environment. These most prominent risk factors were predictors for depression among both mothers and fathers.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/09/190923111249.htm
Mothers' pregnancy-related anxiety may alter how infants' brains respond to sad speech
November 12, 2019
Science Daily/Aalto University
A study has shown a potential link between pregnancy-related anxiety and how a baby's brains respond to sad speech. Researchers at Aalto University and the University of Turku in Finland showed that mothers with high anxiety scores at 24 weeks of pregnancy gave birth to babies who had reduced brain responses to sad-sounding speech. The effect was significantly smaller at 34 weeks of pregnancy, suggesting the effects of pregnancy-related anxiety may be transferred more easily to the unborn baby in mid- rather than late pregnancy. Studying a larger group would make it possible to understand the behavioral implications of the observed changes.
"Areas of the baby's brain that deal with emotion and speech were less active when listening to sad speech if the baby's mothers had reported high pregnancy-related anxiety" said Dr Ilkka Nissilä, a research fellow at Aalto University who is one of the authors of the study.
Pregnancy-related anxiety refers to worries specifically concerning the pregnancy, such as worries about changes in appearance, labor and birth, the health of the developing child and future parenting. Previous studies have already shown a link between anxiety during pregnancy and neurodevelopment in infants, which prompted the researchers to investigate emotional speech and anxiety in this study.
"While we can observe a change in brain response, we can't say for sure how it is related to behavior, or how the changes we've observed affect the child over time " said Dr Nissilä. "What we know for certain is that a larger study with more subjects is needed to understand how such observations made using neuroimaging are related to the development of the babies as they grow up."
Professor Hasse Karlsson, professor of integrative neuroscience and psychiatry at the University of Turku said "One of the advantages of the FinnBrain study is that the babies will be followed up for several years. This makes it possible to later find out if this finding is related to any clinically relevant outcomes."
The study examined the data of 19 mother-baby pairs from Finland. The brain scanning was done with a technique called diffuse optical tomography or DOT, which uses a set of light sources and detectors attached on the side of the baby's head to measure changes in blood flow [AM5] in the brain. The method allows the study to take place while the baby is in its mother's lap, and is almost silent, as opposed to the fMRI scans often used in functional neuroscience experiments which require lying still in a loud scanner. The DOT equipment meant that the researchers could easily play speech sounds to the babies whilst simultaneously scanning their brains. They hope to be able to improve the DOT technology further for future work by making it wireless.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/11/191112090637.htm
New way to think about brain's link to postpartum depression
Research in animals shows brain's immune system is activated by stress during pregnancy
October 21, 2019
Science Daily/Ohio State University
Chronic stress during pregnancy triggers an immune response in the brain that has potential to alter brain functions in ways that could contribute to postpartum depression, new research in animals suggests.
The study is the first to show evidence of this gestational stress response in the brain, which is unexpected because the immune system in both the body and the brain is suppressed during a normal pregnancy.
The Ohio State University researchers who made the discovery have been studying the brain biology behind postpartum depression for several years, creating depressive symptoms in pregnant rats by exposing them to chronic stress. Chronic stress during pregnancy is a common predictor of postpartum depression, which is characterized by extreme sadness, anxiety and exhaustion that can interfere with a mother's ability to care for herself or her baby.
Stress is known to lead to inflammation, which prompts an immune response to protect against inflammation's harmful effects. Based on what they already know about compromised brain signaling in rats stressed during pregnancy, the scientists suspect the immune cells in the brain responding to stress may be involved. If that's the case, the immune changes may create circumstances in the brain that increase susceptibility to depression.
In unstressed pregnant rats, the normal suppression of the immune system in the body and the brain remained intact throughout pregnancy. In contrast, stressed rats showed evidence of neuroinflammation. The study also showed that the stressed rats' immune response in the rest of their bodies was not active.
"That suggests there's this disconnect between what's happening in the body and what's happening in the brain," said Benedetta Leuner, associate professor of psychology at Ohio State and lead author of the study. She speculated that the signaling changes her lab has seen before in the brain and this immune response are happening in parallel, and may be directly related.
Leuner presented the findings Saturday (Oct. 19, 2019) at the Society for Neuroscience meeting in Chicago.
In this work, rats are exposed to unpredictable and varied stressful events throughout their pregnancies, a practice that adds a component of psychological stress but does not harm the health of the mother or her offspring.
In the stressed animals, the researchers found numerous pro-inflammatory compounds that indicated there was an increase in the number and activity levels of the primary immune cells in the brain called microglia. Their findings also suggested the microglia were affecting brain cells in the process.
Leuner's lab previously determined in rats that chronic stress during pregnancy prevented motherhood-related increases in dendritic spines, which are hair-like growths on brain cells that are used to exchange information with other neurons. These same rats behaved in ways similar to what is seen in human moms with postpartum depression: They had less physical interaction with their babies and showed depressive-like symptoms.
Leuner and colleagues now plan to see whether the brain immune cells activated during gestational stress are responsible for the dendritic spine elimination. They suspect that microglia might be clearing away synaptic material on dendrites.
Leuner has partnered on this research with Kathryn Lenz, assistant professor of psychology at Ohio State, whose work explores the role of the immune system in brain development.
Though pregnancy was known to suppress the body's immune system, Lenz and Leuner showed in a previous study that the same suppression of the immune system happens in the brain during pregnancy -- the number of microglia in the brain decreases.
"By layering gestational stress onto a normal pregnancy, we're finding this normal immunosuppression that should happen during pregnancy doesn't occur, and in fact there's evidence of inflammatory signaling in the brain that could be bad for dendritic spines and synapses," Lenz said. "But we've also found changes in the microglia's appetite. Every characteristic we've looked at in these cells has changed as a result of this stress."
The researchers are now trying to visualize microglia while they're performing their cleanup to see if they are eating synaptic material. They are also manipulating inflammatory changes in the brain to see if that reverses postpartum depression-like behavior in rats.
"We've seen the depressive-like symptoms and neural changes in terms of dendritic spines and synapses, and now we have neuroimmune changes suggesting that those microglia could be contributing to the neural changes -- which we think ultimately underlie the behaviors," Leuner said.
The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/10/191021151538.htm
Stress during pregnancy may affect baby's sex, risk of preterm birth
October 15, 2019
Science Daily/Columbia University Irving Medical Center
A new study has identified markers of maternal stress -- both physical and psychological -- that may influence a baby's sex and the likelihood of preterm birth.
It's becoming well established that maternal stress during pregnancy can affect fetal and child development as well as birth outcomes, and a new study from researchers at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons and NewYork-Presbyterian now identifies the types of physical and psychological stress that may matter most.
The study was published online in the journal PNAS, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"The womb is an influential first home, as important as the one a child is raised in, if not more so," says study leader Catherine Monk, PhD, professor of medical psychology at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons and director of Women's Mental Health in the Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center.
Because stress can manifest in a variety of ways, both as a subjective experience and in physical and lifestyle measurements, Monk and her colleagues examined 27 indicators of psychosocial, physical, and lifestyle stress collected from questionnaires, diaries, and daily physical assessments of 187 otherwise healthy pregnant women, ages 18 to 45.
About 17% (32) of the women were psychologically stressed, with clinically meaningful high levels of depression, anxiety, and perceived stress. Another 16% (30) were physically stressed, with relatively higher daily blood pressure and greater caloric intake compared with other healthy pregnant women. The majority (nearly 67%, or 125) were healthy.
Fewer Baby Boys with Mental Stress?
The study suggested that pregnant women experiencing physical and psychological stress are less likely to have a boy. On average, around 105 males are born for every 100 female births. But in this study, the sex ratio in the physically and psychologically stressed groups favored girls, with male-to-female ratios of 4:9 and 2:3, respectively.
"Other researchers have seen this pattern after social upheavals, such as the 9/11 terrorist attacks in New York City, after which the relative number of male births decreased," says Monk. "This stress in women is likely of long-standing nature; studies have shown that males are more vulnerable to adverse prenatal environments, suggesting that highly stressed women may be less likely to give birth to a male due to the loss of prior male pregnancies, often without even knowing they were pregnant."
Other Impacts of Stress
· Physically stressed mothers, with higher blood pressure and caloric intake, were more likely to give birth prematurely than unstressed mothers.
· Among physically stressed mothers, fetuses had reduced heart rate-movement coupling -- an indicator of slower central nervous system development -- compared with unstressed mothers.
· Psychologically stressed mothers had more birth complications than physically stressed mothers.
Social Support Matters
The researchers also found that what most differentiated the three groups was the amount of social support a mother received from friends and family. For example, the more social support a mother received, the greater the likelihood of her having a male baby.
When social support was statistically equalized across the groups, the stress effects on preterm birth disappeared. "Screening for depression and anxiety are gradually becoming a routine part of prenatal practice," says Monk. "But while our study was small, the results suggest enhancing social support is potentially an effective target for clinical intervention."
An estimated 30% of pregnant women report psychosocial stress from job strain or related to depression and anxiety, according to the researchers. Such stress has been associated with increased risk of premature birth, which is linked to higher rates of infant mortality and of physical and mental disorders, such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder and anxiety, among offspring.
How a mother's mental state might specifically affect a fetus was not examined in the study. "We know from animal studies that exposure to high levels of stress can raise levels of stress hormones like cortisol in the uterus, which in turn can affect the fetus," says Monk. "Stress can also affect the mother's immune system, leading to changes that affect neurological and behavioral development in the fetus. What's clear from our study is that maternal mental health matters, not only for the mother but also for her future child."
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/10/191015171554.htm
Even mother's mild depressive symptoms affect the child's emotional well-being
September 23, 2019
Science Daily/National Institute for Health and Welfare
According to recent research, even mild long-term depressive symptoms among mothers are connected with emotional problems among small children such as hyperactivity, aggressiveness and anxiety.
The study investigated how the depressive symptoms of both parents affected the child by the age of two and five.
The father's depressive symptoms affected the child's emotional problems only if the mother was depressed as well. The mother's symptoms, however, affected the child even if the father was not depressed.
Moderate depressive symptoms can be observed in over 20% of parents in Finland. Most serious symptoms are seen in less than 9% of mothers and around 2.5% of fathers.
"Depression among parents both during and after pregnancy not only affects the person suffering from depression but also has a long-term impact on the well-being of the newborn child. Even in cases of mild depression, it is important that the symptoms are identified and the parents are offered support as early as possible, if necessary already during the pregnancy," explains Visiting Researcher Johanna Pietikäinen from the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL).
"In families, depression experienced by the mother has a key impact on the child's well-being. In Finland, the maternity clinic system functions well, but attention should be paid to depressive symptoms among mothers over a longer period: from the pregnancy through to the end of the child's first year of age," she adds.
One parent's depression also puts the other at risk
The depression of one parent is a factor that can put the other parent at risk of depression as well. In addition, depressive symptoms among mothers and fathers are quite long-term: they can start already during pregnancy and continue past the child's first birthday.
"It is important to monitor the mental well-being of both parents during pregnancy and after the birth of the child, and if one parent shows symptoms of depression then the symptoms of the other parent should also be examined. Currently, however, fathers' psychological well-being is not necessarily covered by depression questionnaires in maternity clinics, for example," Pietikäinen points out.
Prior depression is the most significant risk factor
Long-term depression is an indication that the depression may have been experienced already before the pregnancy. Previous experience of depression was, in fact, one of the key risk factors for moderate or severe depressive symptoms.
Other significant risk factors included sleep deprivation during pregnancy, stress, anxiety and a bad family environment. These most prominent risk factors were predictors for depression among both mothers and fathers.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/09/190923111249.htm
Pregnant women with PTSD have higher levels of stress hormone cortisol
December 5, 2017
Science Daily/University of Michigan
A woman's emotional and physical health during pregnancy impacts a developing fetus, research shows. However, less is known about the effect of past stressors and posttraumatic stress disorder on an expectant woman.
To that end, researchers at the University of Michigan measured the stress hormone cortisol in pregnant women from early pregnancy to when their baby was 6 weeks old. They found that those with a dissociative type of PTSD that's often related to childhood abuse or trauma had levels up to 10 times higher than their peers.
These toxic levels of cortisol may contribute to health problems in the next generation, said Julia Seng, professor of nursing and lead author on the study.
"We know from research on the developmental origins of health and disease that the baby's first environment in its mother's body has implications for health across the lifespan," Seng said. "Higher exposure to cortisol may signal the fetus to adapt in ways that help survival, but don't help health and longevity. This finding is very useful because it helps us know which women are most likely to exhibit the highest level of stress and stress hormones during pregnancy and postpartum."
Cortisol is sometimes called the stress hormone because it's released in stressful situations as part of the flight-or-fight response. Cortisol levels that stay high are linked to serious health problems such as heart disease and high blood pressure, and can fuel weight gain, depression and anxiety plus a host of other problems. The effect of elevated cortisol on a developing fetus isn't well understood, but high cortisol and stress also contribute to preterm birth
In the study, 395 women expecting their first child were divided into four groups: those without trauma, those with a trauma but no PTSD, those with classic PTSD and those with dissociative PTSD.
Researchers measured salivary cortisol at different times during the day. Then 111 of those women gave saliva specimens until postpartum. The difference in cortisol was greatest in early pregnancy, when levels were eight times higher in the afternoon and 10 times higher at bedtime for the dissociative group than for other women.
About 8 percent of pregnant women in the study had PTSD, a disorder that results when symptoms of anxiety and fear persist well after exposure to stressful events. About 14 percent of that group had the more complex dissociative PTSD, which was associated with higher cortisol.
"It's been a mystery in our field why cortisol is sometimes high with PTSD and sometimes not," Seng said. "This finding that in pregnancy it's only the dissociative subgroup that has high cortisol gives us more to go on for future research."
Seng was surprised at how high the cortisol was in the dissociative group. She also said researchers expected women with classic PTSD to experience elevated cortisol as well, and the fact that they didn't is good news.
"We can do something for the 1-to-2 out of 100 pregnant women who have this dissociative PTSD," Seng said. "We can work with them to make pregnancy, maternity care, labor, breastfeeding and early parenting less likely to trigger stress reactions. And we can connect them to mental health services when they are ready to treat their PTSD."
Seng and collaborator Mickey Sperlich have developed a PTSD-specific education program for pregnant woman with a childhood trauma called the Survivor Moms' Companion, which has been piloted in Michigan and is currently being piloted in England.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/12/171205130121.htm
Mother's stress hormone levels may affect fetal growth and long term health of child
January 26, 2015
Science Daily/University of Cambridge
Increased levels of stress hormones can lead pregnant mice to overeat, but affect growth of the fetus and, potentially, the long term health of the offspring, according to a new study.
The foetuses of the mice with raised levels of the stress hormone tended to be smaller, despite the mother overeating, suggesting that a mother's stress levels may affect her child's growth.
In the Journal of Physiology, researchers at the Department of Physiology, Development and Neuroscience at the University of Cambridge examine whether levels of the stress hormones known as glucocorticoids can influence the supply of glucose from mother to foetus. Glucocorticoids are important in regulating metabolism in adults as well as in the foetus. Levels of the hormone are raised by stress related to the physical or social environment, disease or pregnancy.
Pregnant mice received the natural glucocorticoid corticosterone at different times during pregnancy via their drinking water, either from days 11 to 16, days 14-19, or not at all; pregnancy in mice lasts 21 days and the days on which corticosterone was given corresponds to different developmental phases of the placenta. This treatment was designed to produce glucocorticoid levels in the mother similar to those seen in stressful conditions. The animals were either allowed to eat freely or their food intake limited to that of normal, untreated mice. The researchers then measured the amount of glucose crossing the placenta, the organ that supplies all of the substances required for foetal growth, in a specific period of time.
The researchers found that when corticosterone was given later in pregnancy and the mice allowed to eat freely, the mother ate more but her placenta was less able to transport glucose to the foetus, leading to a decrease in the size of the foetus. This effect was not seen when the hormone was administered earlier in pregnancy or when the diet was restricted. They believe this may be because, under stress and with an unlimited diet, the activity of certain genes in the placenta was modified, including that of the gene Redd1. This gene is believed to signal availability of other substances, like oxygen, and to interact with intracellular pathways regulating growth and nutrient uptake in other tissues of the body. The team believe that future studies may prove this molecule is important in the placenta in linking environmental effects to the nutrition of the foetus.
Together with previous work, the findings show that maternal glucocorticoids regulate foetal nutrition by acting on the placenta. The researchers believe that glucocorticoid levels in pregnant women may therefore determine the specific combination of nutrients received by the foetus and influence the long term metabolic health of their children as a result.
Dr Owen Vaughan from the University of Cambridge says: "The foetuses of the mice with raised levels of the stress hormone tended to be smaller, despite the mother overeating, suggesting that a mother's stress levels may affect her child's growth. We showed that this is likely to be because the stress hormone reduced the ability of the placenta to pass essential nutrients to the foetus."
The researchers believe this study may have implications for women stressed during pregnancy or treated clinically with glucocorticoids, if the mechanisms are similar in humans, though it is unclear yet the extent to which changes in the ability of the placenta to transport nutrients to the foetus exacerbate or protect the child from the potential adverse effects of glucocorticoid overexposure during pregnancy. Nor is it clear whether maternal diet influences the outcome of glucocorticoid overexposure during human pregnancy.
Professor Abby Fowden, who led the research, adds: "It may be that by changing her diet, a mother can counter the effects of stress hormones on the human placenta. In other words, a mother's 'hormonal profile' may dictate the most appropriate diet for a successful outcome of pregnancy. We need more research in this area before we can start giving such advice, however."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/01/150126095717.htm