Lambregtse-van den Berg Mijke P, Tiemeier Henning, Verhulst Frank C, Jaddoe Vincent, Tindall Elizabeth, Vlachos Haido, Aumayer Katie, Iles Jane, Ramchandani Paul G
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry/Psychology, Erasmus MC-University Medical Centre, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; Department of Psychiatry, Erasmus MC-University Medical Centre, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry/Psychology, Erasmus MC-University Medical Centre, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; Department of Psychiatry, Erasmus MC-University Medical Centre, Rotterdam, The Netherlands; Department of Social and Behavioral Science, Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, Boston, United States.
Eur Psychiatry. 2018 Oct;54:77-84. doi: 10.1016/j.eurpsy.2018.07.007. Epub 2018 Aug 18.
Early childhood aggressive behaviour is a predictor of future violence. Therefore, identifying risk factors for children's aggressive behaviour is important in understanding underlying mechanisms. Maternal postpartum depression is a known risk factor. However, little research has focused on the influence of paternal behaviour on early childhood aggression and its interaction with maternal postpartum depression.
This study was performed in two cohorts: the Fathers Project, in the United Kingdom (n = 143) and the Generation R Study, in The Netherlands (n = 549). In both cohorts, we related paternal antisocial personality (ASP) traits and maternal postpartum depressive (PPD) symptoms to childhood aggressive behaviour at age two (Fathers Project) and age three (Generation R Study). We additionally tested whether the presence of paternal ASP traits increased the association between maternal PPD-symptoms and early childhood aggression.
The association between paternal ASP traits and early childhood aggressive behaviour, corrected for maternal PPD-symptoms, was similar in magnitude between the cohorts (Fathers Project: standardized β = 0.12, p = 0.146; Generation R: β = 0.14, p = 0.001), although the association was not statistically significant in the Fathers Project. Strikingly, and in contrast to our expectations, there was evidence of a negative interaction between paternal ASP traits and maternal PPD-symptoms on childhood aggressive behaviour (Fathers Project: β = -0.20, p = 0.020; Generation R: β = -0.09, p = 0.043) in both studies. This meant that with higher levels of paternal ASP traits the association between maternal PPD-symptoms and childhood aggressive behaviour was less and vice versa.
Our findings stress the importance of including both maternal and paternal psychopathology in future studies and interventions focusing on early childhood aggressive behaviour.
儿童期攻击性行为是未来暴力行为的一个预测指标。因此，识别儿童攻击性行为的风险因素对于理解其潜在机制至关重要。母亲产后抑郁是一个已知的风险因素。然而，很少有研究关注父亲行为对儿童期攻击行为的影响及其与母亲产后抑郁的相互作用。
本研究在两个队列中进行：英国的父亲项目（n = 143）和荷兰的R代研究（n = 549）。在这两个队列中，我们将父亲的反社会人格（ASP）特质和母亲的产后抑郁（PPD）症状与两岁（父亲项目）和三岁（R代研究）儿童的攻击性行为联系起来。我们还测试了父亲ASP特质的存在是否增加了母亲PPD症状与儿童期攻击行为之间的关联。
在校正母亲PPD症状后，两个队列中父亲ASP特质与儿童期攻击行为之间的关联程度相似（父亲项目：标准化β = 0.12，p = 0.146；R代研究：β = 0.14，p = 0.001），尽管在父亲项目中该关联无统计学意义。令人惊讶的是，与我们的预期相反，在两项研究中均有证据表明父亲ASP特质与母亲PPD症状在儿童期攻击行为上存在负向相互作用（父亲项目：β = -0.20，p = 0.020；R代研究：β = -0.09，p = 0.043）。这意味着父亲ASP特质水平越高，母亲PPD症状与儿童期攻击行为之间的关联越小，反之亦然。
我们的研究结果强调了在未来针对儿童期攻击行为的研究和干预中纳入母亲和父亲精神病理学的重要性。
