Merrill Palmer Skillman Institute for Child and Family Development, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, USA.
Midwifery Science, AVAG, Amsterdam Public Health Research Institute, VU University Medical Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Dev Sci. 2018 Jul;21(4):e12612. doi: 10.1111/desc.12612. Epub 2017 Oct 22.
Maternal anxiety during pregnancy can negatively affect fetal neurodevelopment, predisposing the offspring to a higher risk of behavioral and emotional problems later in life. The current study investigates the association between maternal anxiety during pregnancy and child affective picture processing using event-related brain potentials (ERPs). Mothers reported anxiety during the second trimester using the anxiety subscale of the Symptom Checklist (SCL-90). At age 4 years, child affective picture processing (N = 86) was measured by recording ERPs during viewing of neutral, pleasant, and unpleasant pictures selected from the International Affective Pictures System. The late positive potential (LPP)-an ERP component reflecting individual differences in affective processing-was used as child outcome. The expected positive association between maternal anxiety and LPP amplitude for unpleasant pictures was not found. Nevertheless, we found a positive association between maternal anxiety during pregnancy and LPP amplitudes for neutral pictures in the middle and late time window at anterior locations (all p < .05). These associations remained significant after adjusting for maternal postnatal anxiety and gestational age at birth and after FDR correction for multiple comparisons. Our study provides neurophysiological evidence that children prenatally exposed to higher maternal anxiety devote more attentional resources to neutral pictures, but not to unpleasant pictures. Possibly, these children show enhanced vigilance for threat when viewing neutral pictures. Although useful in dangerous environments, this enhanced vigilance may predispose children prenatally exposed to higher maternal anxiety to developing behavioral and/or emotional problems later in life. A video abstract of this article can be viewed at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEzYi6IS2HA.
孕妇焦虑会对胎儿的神经发育产生负面影响，使后代在以后的生活中更容易出现行为和情绪问题。本研究使用事件相关电位（ERP）来研究孕妇焦虑与儿童情感图片处理之间的关系。母亲在妊娠中期使用症状清单（SCL-90）的焦虑分量表报告焦虑。在 4 岁时，通过记录儿童在观看国际情感图片系统中选择的中性、愉快和不愉快图片时的 ERP，来测量儿童的情感图片处理（N=86）。晚期正电位（LPP）——一种反映情感处理个体差异的 ERP 成分——被用作儿童的结果。我们预计母亲焦虑与不愉快图片的 LPP 振幅之间会存在正相关，但并未发现这种相关性。然而，我们发现，在中、晚期时间窗口，在额前位置，母亲在妊娠期间的焦虑与中性图片的 LPP 振幅呈正相关（所有 p<.05）。这些关联在调整了母亲产后焦虑和出生时的胎龄以及对多重比较进行 FDR 校正后仍然显著。我们的研究提供了神经生理学证据，表明在子宫内暴露于较高水平的母亲焦虑的儿童会对中性图片投入更多的注意力，但对不愉快图片则不会。可能这些孩子在观看中性图片时对威胁表现出更高的警惕性。虽然这种增强的警惕性在危险环境中是有用的，但它可能使在子宫内暴露于较高水平的母亲焦虑的儿童更容易在以后的生活中出现行为和/或情绪问题。本文的视频摘要可在以下网址观看：https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEzYi6IS2HA。
