Greater caregiving risk, better infant memory performance?

Abstract

Poor early life care often relates to cognitive difficulties. However, newer work suggests that in early-life, adversity may associate with enhanced or accelerated neurodevelopment. We examine associations between postnatal caregiving risks (i.e., higher self-reported postnatal-anxiety and lower observed maternal sensitivity) and infant relational memory (i.e., via deferred imitation and relational binding). Using subsamples of 67-181 infants (aged 433-477 post-conceptual days, or roughly five to seven months since birth) taking part in the GUSTO study, we found such postnatal caregiving risk significantly predictive of "better" performance on a relational binding task following a brief delay, after Bonferroni adjustments. Subsequent analyses suggest that the association between memory and these risks may specifically be apparent among infants spending at least 50% of their waking hours in the presence of their mothers. Our findings echo neuroimaging research concerning similar risk exposure and larger infant hippocampal volume, and likewise underscore the importance of considering developmental context in understanding early life experience. With this in mind, these findings caution against the use of cognitive outcomes as indices of experienced risk.

Maternal antenatal anxiety and electrophysiological functioning amongst a sub-set of preschoolers participating in the GUSTO cohort

“…If preschoolers (born to mothers low on antenatal anxiety) were better at forming associations between the colorsfaces-and-actors during the pre-switch condition, they would have, de facto, have had more need for exogenous inhibition during the post-switch, and so more pronounced N1-POSTs. Indeed, within GUSTO, antenatal anxiety associates with infant hippocampal development [47] and worsened memory for associations between pairs [48].…”

An initial investigation of neonatal neuroanatomy, caregiving, and levels of disorganized behavior

“…In addition, we controlled for whether or not infants spent 50% of their time with their mother, as assessed via a detailed questionnaire completed by mothers at the time of the 6-mo visit. This was included as we have previously reported that maternal exposure may influence sensitivity's association with infant outcomes (65,66). Given concerns regarding power, other potential covariates (antenatal household income, antenatal depression, antenatal anxiety, gestational age, gender, antenatal maternal exposure to smoking, attachment assessment type) were screened, and as none were related to both the predictor (sensitivity) and the outcome (disorganization scores) at P < 0.10 in either the larger GUSTO sample with available data (n = 241) or within the current subsample, no additional covariates were included.…”

Caregiving adversity during infancy and preschool cognitive function: adaptations to context?

“…Similarly, rat pups who have experienced early maternal separation and/or exogenous corticosteroids show a prolonged retention of fear-related memories 23 . Accordingly, lower levels of sensitivity relate to less extinction of fear during preschool 24 as well as developmentally advanced memory patterns 25 in humans. Such abilities may be important when navigating relatively adverse environments, perhaps especially when maternal support is comparatively unavailable.…”