Maternal depressive symptoms and children’s cognitive school readiness: The role of gene-environment interplay and parenting behaviours

• In Event: Poster Session 09
  In Poster Session: PS 09 Topic - School Readiness/Childcare

Abstract

Maternal depressive symptoms are a robust risk factor for poor cognitive outcomes in children (Ahun & Côté 2019; Liu et al., 2017; Rogers et al., 2020). However, no study to date has accounted for the interplay between genes and the environment in this association. We evaluated the role of gene-environment interaction (GxE) and mother-child interactions in the association between maternal depressive symptoms and children’s cognitive school readiness. Data are from a Canadian population-based birth cohort of 538 monozygotic and dizygotic twin pairs. Mothers reported their depressive symptoms when children were 6 and 18 months old using the Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression scale. Trained interviewers observed mother-child interactions (coercion, stimulation, verbalization) using the Home Observation for Measurement of Environment when children were 2½ years and assessed children’s cognitive school readiness at 5 years using the Lollipop test. We used Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) to estimate GxE while accounting for gene-environment correlation (rGE) and any remaining direct contribution of maternal depressive symptoms to children’s cognitive school readiness. We also used SEM to test the mediating role of maternal parenting behaviours. Consistent with past studies, shared environmental factors explained a large proportion (49%) of the variance in children’s cognitive school readiness, with genetic (33%) and non-shared environmental (18%) factors explaining the remaining variance. A GxE model was tested with maternal depressive symptoms as the environmental moderator, while accounting for rGE. Maternal depressive symptoms moderated the amount of variance in children’s cognitive school readiness explained by genetic factors, whereby heritability estimates decreased as the level of maternal depressive symptoms increased (mA = -.40 [95% CI -.76;-.04]). No gene-environment correlation (i.e., rGE) was found. Maternal verbalization in mother-child interactions mediated the residual association between maternal depressive symptoms and children’s cognitive school readiness. Maternal depressive symptoms moderate genetic contributions to children’s cognitive school readiness. Future studies testing the mediating role of maternal parenting behaviours in genetically informed studies may help elucidate mechanisms of the association between maternal depressive symptoms and children’s cognitive school readiness.

Authors

• Marilyn N Ahun, Harvard University
  Presenting Author

• Sylvana M Côté, Université de Montréal (UdeM)
  Non-Presenting Author

• Mara Brendgen, L'Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM)
  Non-Presenting Author

• Frank Vitaro, Université de Montréal
  Non-Presenting Author

• Richard E Tremblay, Université de Montréal
  Non-Presenting Author

• Michel Boivin, Universite Laval
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ginette Dionne, Universite Laval
  Non-Presenting Author