Singapore Institute for Clinical Sciences, Singapore.
Biol Psychiatry. 2013 Dec 1;74(11):837-44. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2013.06.019. Epub 2013 Aug 19.
Antenatal maternal cortisol levels associate with alterations in the amygdala, a structure associated with emotion regulation, in the offspring. However, because offspring brain and behavior are commonly assessed years after birth, the timing of such maternal influences is unclear. This study aimed to examine the association between antenatal maternal depressive symptomatology and neonatal amygdala volume and microstructure and thus establish evidence for the transgenerational transmission of vulnerability for affective disorders during prenatal development.
Our study recruited Asian mothers at 10 to 13 weeks pregnancy and assessed maternal depression at 26 weeks gestation using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale. Structural magnetic resonance imaging and diffusion tensor imaging were performed with 157 nonsedated, 6- to 14-day-old newborns and then analyzed to extract the volume, fractional anisotropy, and axial diffusivity values of the amygdala.
Adjusting for household income, maternal age, and smoking exposure, postconceptual age at magnetic resonance imaging, and birth weight, we found significantly lower fractional anisotropy (p = .009) and axial diffusivity (p = .028), but not volume (p = .993), in the right amygdala in the infants of mothers with high compared with those with low-normal Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale scores.
The results reveal a significant relation between antenatal maternal depression and the neonatal microstructure of the right amygdala, a brain region closely associated with stress reactivity and vulnerability for mood anxiety disorders. These findings suggest the prenatal transmission of vulnerability for depression from mother to child and that interventions targeting maternal depression should begin early in pregnancy.
产前母体皮质醇水平与后代杏仁核的变化有关，杏仁核是与情绪调节相关的结构。然而，由于后代的大脑和行为通常在出生后数年进行评估，因此这种母体影响的时间尚不清楚。本研究旨在检查产前母体抑郁症状与新生儿杏仁核体积和微观结构之间的关系，从而为产前发育过程中情感障碍易感性的代际传递提供证据。
我们的研究招募了 10 至 13 周孕期的亚洲母亲，并在 26 周妊娠时使用爱丁堡产后抑郁量表评估母亲的抑郁情况。对 157 名未镇静的 6 至 14 天大的新生儿进行结构磁共振成像和弥散张量成像，并对其进行分析以提取杏仁核的体积、各向异性分数和轴向弥散度值。
调整家庭收入、母亲年龄和吸烟暴露、磁共振成像时的孕龄和出生体重后，我们发现高爱丁堡产后抑郁量表评分组母亲的婴儿右杏仁核的各向异性分数（p =.009）和轴向弥散度（p =.028）显著降低（p =.993），但体积无差异。
这些结果揭示了产前母体抑郁与新生儿右杏仁核微观结构之间存在显著关系，杏仁核是与应激反应和情绪焦虑障碍易感性密切相关的脑区。这些发现表明，从母亲到孩子的抑郁易感性存在产前传递，针对母体抑郁的干预措施应在妊娠早期开始。
