The Role of Prenatal Maternal Stress and Anxiety on Offspring Neurodevelopment
Open Access DepositedElucidating Transgenerational Effects of Maternal Mental Health
Maternal stress and anxiety are increasingly recognized to have detrimental effects on fetal and neonatal brain structure and emotional development in young children. This dissertation seeks to determine how maternal stress and anxiety mediate the connection between offspring’s brain and behavioral development. We studied mother-baby dyads from two serial, prospective, and longitudinal studies on infant brain development
224 were recruited during the COVID-19 pandemic (2020-2022) into a longitudinal infant brain development study to compare to 103 recruited from a healthy normative pre-pandemic cohort (2014-2019). Across cohorts, prenatal exposure to maternal stress and anxiety was evaluated using the Perceived Stress Scale and the Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, respectively. Quantitative MRI studies were performed at a neonatal visit within the first few weeks of life. Toddler development was assessed using the Infant-Toddler Social Emotional Assessment (ITSEA) and the Bayley Scales of Infant Development, Third Edition (BSID-III) when the child was approximately 2 years of age. The first aim of this dissertation determined the relationship between newborn and toddler development in a healthy normative cohort to lay the groundwork for subsequent analyses. Gray matter structure was associated with behavioral development, while cortical gyrification was related to cognitive development. As maternal mental health was found to present differently in the pandemic cohort, an in-depth analysis was performed to assess the complete profiles of perinatal anxiety across cohorts. The second aim of this dissertation examined the relationship between prenatal maternal stress and anxiety and the newborn brain across cohorts, finding smaller left amygdalar volumes being associated with high levels of exposure. In the third aim of this dissertation, this relationship between prenatal maternal mental health and newborn left amygdalar volumes was found to mediate the behavioral outcomes of the child as they reached toddlerhood. This work emphasizes the importance of mental health during the perinatal period, both for the mother and the fetus. The findings of this dissertation present an area for early detection and intervention in early childhood development by being able to detect as early as on a newborn MRI scan differences in neurodevelopment due to prenatal exposure to maternal stress and anxiety.
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