Prenatal Smoking, Parental Offending, and Offspring Behavioural and Cognitive Vulnerability in Early Childhood

• In Event: Childhood Risk Factors and Life-Course Outcomes

Abstract

Epidemiological methods rarely inform criminological research, despite the fact that the focus of epidemiology (incidence, aetiology, timing, prevention) is congruent with criminology, and particularly with developmental and life-course criminology. We adopt an “EpiCrim” approach to examine the impact of prenatal smoking and maternal offending on offspring’s behavioral and cognitive vulnerabilities. The sample includes 66,523 Australian children and their parents from the New South Wales Child Development Study (http://nsw-cds.com.au), a multi-agency record linkage study. Information from a teacher-reported survey of childhood development was linked with justice and health records. Offspring outcomes at age 5 years included: aggression; hyperactivity and inattention; anxiety; responsibility and respect; literacy; and numeracy. The two key exposures were prenatal smoking (none/0-10/>10 cigarettes per day) and maternal offending (0/ 1/≥2 offenses). Unadjusted and adjusted (low birth weight, paternal offending, maternal substance abuse, socio-demographics) logistic regression analyses and population attributable fractions were completed. Results showed that prenatal smoking and maternal offending increased the odds of offspring vulnerability across the six outcomes, with literacy and numeracy being impacted the most. A dose-response relationship was observed for prenatal smoking; exposure to >10 cigarettes/day had a greater impact than 1-10 cigarettes. Findings highlight the need for preventative intervention in the prenatal period.

Authors

• Stacy Tzoumakis, University of New South Wales

• Melissa J Green, University of New South Wales

• Kimberlie Dean, University of New South Wales

• Kristin R Laurens, University of New South Wales

• Maina Kariuki, University of New South Wales

• Jolie Hutchinson, University of New South Wales

• Felicity Harris, University of New South Wales

• Vaughan Carr, University of New South Wales