2-074 - Examining the Impact of Maternal Depression on Offspring Development Across Childhood and Adolescence

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

It is well established that offspring of depressed mothers are at increased risk for a range of negative outcomes across childhood and adolescence including early behavioural, emotional and cognitive difficulties, under-achieving in school, psychiatric disorder and suicide-related behaviour. However, the pathways involved in the transmission of risk from mothers to offspring are poorly understood. Targeted prevention can be effective but relies on a good understanding of mechanisms underlying the intergenerational transmission of risk, therefore establishing why offspring of depressed mothers are at increased risk for negative outcomes compared to offspring of non-depressed mothers is a crucial question. Additionally, it is important to examine alternative explanations for associations observed by simultaneously testing competing mechanisms, adjusting for potential confounders and considering the possibility of reverse causation to identify potential modifiable intervention targets.

This symposium aims to examine these issues across different developmental periods from pre-school to adolescence using longitudinal, population-based birth cohorts and several complementary analytic approaches. Presentation one uses a UK cohort to examine whether the association between maternal depression throughout childhood and suicidal ideation in adolescence is mediated by offspring emotional and behavioural symptoms. Presentation two uses the same cohort to investigate the association between postnatal depression and executive function abilities and to test whether disruption to these abilities mediates associations between postnatal depression and exam results and depressed mood in adolescence. Presentation three examines cross-lagged effects across multiple time points in early childhood using a Canadian cohort to investigate interrelations between maternal depression and child’s behavioural and emotional problems.

Sub Unit

• Developmental Psychopathology

Chair

• Gemma Hammerton, Cardiff University

Discussant

• Daniel S. Shaw, Univ of Pittsburgh

Individual Presentations

• Explaining Risk for Suicide-Related Behaviour in Adolescent Offspring of Depressed Mothers - Presenting Author: Gemma Hammerton, Cardiff University; Stanley Zammit, Cardiff University and University of Bristol; Liam Mahedy, Cardiff University; Rebecca Pearson, University of Oxford; Ruth Sellers, Cambridge Univ; Anita Thapar, Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Section, Institute of Psychological Medicine & Clinical Neurosciences, MRC Centre for Neuropsychiatric Genetics & Genomics, School of Medicine, Cardiff University, Cardiff; Stephan Collishaw, Cardiff University

• The Association Between Postnatal Depression and Offspring Academic Achievement and Depressed Mood in Adolescence - Presenting Author: Rebecca Pearson, University of Oxford; Marc H Bornstein, National Institutes of Health; Miguel Cordero, University of Bristol; Gaia Scerif, Oxford University; Liam Mahedy, Cardiff University; Jonathon Evans, University of Bristol; Alan Stein, University of Oxford and University of Witwatersrand

• Interrelation Between Maternal Depression and Child Aggressive Behaviour and Emotional Problems During Preschool Period - Presenting Author: Chantal Paquin, Université du Québec à Montreal; Catherine Herba, Université du Québec à Montréal; Frank Vitaro, Univ of Montreal; Richard E Tremblay, University of Montreal; Michel Boivin, Laval University