Infants of mothers with higher physiological stress show alterations in brain function

Abstract

Chronic environmental stress has deleterious effects on the developing child. While the type and degree of stress that children experience can vary widely, the downstream influence of varying stressors may impact child development similarly. Of particular interest is building an understanding of how chronic stress impacts brain functioning early in life, as both environmental stress and alterations in patterns of infant brain development have been related to a constellation of subsequent negative developmental outcomes. Among typically developing children, studies using electroencephalography (EEG) have shown that the relative contribution of low-frequency resting EEG power decreases with age, whereas the relative contribution of high-frequency resting EEG power increases with age (Marshall, Bar-Haim, & Fox, 2002). A variety of highly stressful environments have been linked to alterations

Home assessment of visual working memory in pre‐schoolers reveals associations between behaviour, brain activation and parent reports of life stress

“…Furthermore, this finding remained significant after we controlled for parental income and education, suggesting it is unrelated to socioeconomic factors. Our finding is in line with an EEG study by Troller‐Renfree et al (2020) who found that infants of mothers who experienced higher chronic physiological stress showed altered brain activation patterns during the first year of life. They posit that maturational lags in development can persist into later life and have an effect on cognitive processing.…”

Associations of socioeconomic and other environmental factors with early brain development in Bangladeshi infants and children

“…These findings are largely in line with findings from the United Kingdom where infants from low-income households were found to exhibited lower absolute gamma power compared with infants from wealthier households at 6–9 months of age ( Tomalski et al, 2013 ), and Italy where higher socioeconomic status was found to be associated with gamma power in 6-month-old infants ( Cantiani et al, 2019 ). Associations of biological measures of maternal stress (hair cortisol) with children’s EEG power have also been observed in a study from the United States, which found that higher maternal cortisol concentrations in hair (reflecting higher levels of physiological stress within the past 3 months) were associated with higher levels of relative theta and lower levels of relative beta power in 6 to 12-month-old infants ( Troller-Renfree et al, 2020 ). A study of neonates from the United States, however, did not show association of household or neighborhood factors with infant EEG power ( Brito et al, 2016 ), suggesting that such effects emerge during development.…”

“…For example, Pierce et al (2019) reported a negative association of maternal perceived stress with EEG power in the beta and gamma bands, and a positive relationship between maternal education and absolute gamma power in 2-month-old infants from the United States ( Pierce et al, 2019 ). Similarly, Troller-Renfree et al (2020) found that maternal physiological stress (hair cortisol) was positively associated with relative theta power and negatively associated with relative beta power in 6 to 12-month-old infants. Finally, Tomalski et al (2013) have found that household income was positively associated with absolute gamma power in 6–9-month-old infants in the United Kingdom.…”

Impact of restrictions on parental presence in neonatal intensive care units related to coronavirus disease 2019

“…This raises the concern that pregnant and postpartum women may be particularly vulnerable to the psychosocial hardships caused by the pandemic. Studies have also "suggested that higher maternal stress may lead to reductions in warm, contingent caregiving (i.e., caregiver responsiveness), which in turn can affect infant neurodevelopment" [29][30][31]. The described restrictions on parental presence for ill newborns may further magnify the existing stressors associated with the perinatal period and NICU admission.…”