Poster #4 - Maternal Early Adversity and Infant Stress Regulation: Intergenerational Associations and Mediation by Prenatal Mental Health

• In Event: Poster Session 02

Abstract

Stress regulation reflects biologically-based tendencies to distress that emerge early in life and encompasses reactivity to and recovery from stress (Engel & Gunnar, 2020). There is increasing evidence that stress regulation originates in intergenerational processes (Spry et al., 2022). Developmentally, the prenatal period is a sensitive window in which maternal early life experiences are hypothesized to affect offspring outcomes and designates a time when expectant mothers and offspring are more susceptible to stressful and salutary influences (Davis & Narayan, 2020). This prenatal plasticity constituted the focus of the current study where we tested the association of maternal early life adversity with infant stress regulation through maternal prenatal internalizing symptoms and moderation of the antecedents of infant stress regulation by prenatal social support. Mother-infant dyads (n = 162) were followed prospectively and mothers completed assessments of social support and depressive and anxiety symptoms across pregnancy. Infants completed standardized stress paradigms at one month and six months, in which infant cortisol reactivity was assessed. Results offered mixed support for our hypotheses. Consistent with our hypotheses, predictions of infant cortisol reactivity to the heel stick at one month from maternal early life adversity were significantly mediated by maternal prenatal depressive symptoms such that maternal early life adversity positively predicted depressive symptoms in pregnancy, which in turn predicted dampened infant cortisol reactivity. Contrary to our hypotheses, prenatal social support did not significantly moderate predictions of depressive or anxiety symptoms in pregnancy from maternal early life adversity nor did it modify the associations between maternal depressive or anxiety symptoms and infant stress regulation. These results suggest that maternal prenatal mental health is a key mechanism by which maternal early life adverse experiences affect offspring stress regulation.

Authors

• Margot Barclay, University of California - Los Angeles
  Presenting Author

• Gabrielle Rose Rinne, University of California - Los Angeles

• Jennifer Anne Somers, University of California - Los Angeles

• Steve Lee, University of California, Los Angeles

• Mary Coussons-Read, University of Colorado-Colorado Springs

• Chris Dunkel Schetter, University of California - Los Angeles