Poster #142 - Prenatal Stress Fosters Developmental Plasticity

• In Event: 3-003 - Poster Session 09
  In Poster Session: PS 09 Section - Parenting & Parent-Child Relationships

Integrative Statement

Evidence indicating (1) that prenatal stress forecasts heightened negative emotionality in infancy and (2) that this phenotype is itself associated with increased susceptibility to positive and negative postnatal rearing experiences led Pluess and Belsky (2011) to hypothesize that prenatal stress promotes or “programs” postnatal developmental plasticity. Results of a recent animal-model experiment proved consistent with this proposition (Hartman, Freeman, Bales, & Belsky, 2018). To date, however, no study directly links prenatal stress to developmental plasticity within a single data set with human. Thus the present study addressed this issue using data from Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC). As a first step, we addressed whether—and found that-- high prenatal stress predicted increased negative emotionality in 6-month olds. Thereafter we observed that this infant phenotype interacted with observed parenting in predicting social/emotional/behavioral problems at age 10. The form of the interaction proved consistent with “weak” differential susceptibility in that children more negatively emotional as infants exhibited the most behavioral problems if they experienced unsupportive parenting but the least if they experienced supportive parenting. The same “for-better-and-for-worse” pattern of results emerged for less negatively emotional infants, but to a lesser extent. Results are discussed in terms of prenatal stress fostering postnatal plasticity via heightened infant negativity.

Authors

• Xiaoya Zhang, University of California, Davis
  Presenting Author

• Kristina Renee Sayler, University of California, Davis
  Non-Presenting Author

• Sarah Hartman, University of California, Davis
  Non-Presenting Author

• Jay Belsky, University of California, Davis
  Non-Presenting Author