Maternal childhood trauma and perinatal distress are related to infants’ focused attention from 6 to 18 months

Abstract

Maternal distress is repeatedly reported to have negative impacts on the cognitive development in children and is linked to neurodevelopmental disorders (e.g. attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and autism spectrum disorder). However, studies examining the associations between maternal distress and the development of attention in infancy are few. This study investigated the longitudinal relationships between maternal distress (depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and exposure to childhood trauma) and the development of focused attention in infancy in 118 mother-infant dyads. We found that maternal exposure to non-interpersonal traumatic events in childhood was associated with the less focused attention of the infants to audio-visual stimuli at 6, 10, and 18 months. In addition, exposure to interpersonal traumatic events in childhood was identified as a moderator of the negative effect of maternal anxiety during the 2nd trimester on the development of focused attention in infants. We discuss the possible mechanisms accounting for these cross-generational effects. Our findings underscore the importance of maternal mental health to the development of focused attention in infancy and address the need for early screening of maternal mental health during pregnancy.

Intergenerational Transmission of Parental Adverse Childhood Experiences and Children’s Outcomes: A Scoping Review

“…Child outcomes were categorized into six domains: infant/toddler development, child physical/physiological problems, child mental health problems, child internalizing and externalizing problems, child temperament, and child academic performance. Fifteen studies (22.1%) assessed the effects of parental ACEs on infant and toddler developmental outcomes, mainly including four areas: fine and gross motor skills, speech and language development, cognitive development and problem solving, and social-emotional development (Brittain et al, 2021; Chang et al, 2020; Choi et al, 2017; Coe et al, 2020; Folger et al, 2018; Garon-Bissonnette et al, 2022; McDonnell et al, 2016; Miccoli et al, 2022; Racine et al, 2018; Riggs et al, 2022; Sun et al, 2017; Treat et al, 2019; Tu et al, 2021; Wurster et al, 2020; Zhang et al, 2022).…”

“…Bouvette et al (2013) reported that child attachment security moderated the association between maternal adversity and child temperament, and Hatch et al (2020) found that maternal ACEs were only associated with children’s externalizing behaviors in the presence of low family social support. Other scholars revealed that parent hostile/helpless state of mind (Sauvé et al, 2022), parental emotional availability (Wurster et al, 2020), and maternal anxiety (Tu et al, 2021) all moderated the relationship between parental ACEs and child negative health outcomes. However, Wang et al (2022) indicated that parental role had no moderation effect on the association between parental ACEs and child behavioral problems and functioning.…”

“…Along with mediation models, studies of moderating effects may also advance the literature by identifying individual and contextual factors that strengthen or weaken the effects of ACEs. There are many plausible categories of moderators that may influence the intergenerational transmission of ACEs and, unlike studies of mediation in this area, studies of moderation have largely focused on genetic and biological factors such specific gene variants (Bouvette-Turcot et al, 2015), hormones (Thomas-Argyriou et al, 2020), and brain functions (van de Ven et al, 2020). Other moderator groups that have received less attention include demographic indicators such child age and parent education status (Rieder et al, 2019;Stepleton et al, 2018) and psychosocial processes such as parent-child attachment (Bouvette-Turcot et al, 2013) and social support (Hatch et al, 2020).…”

Trauma Aware and Anti-Oppressive Arts-Health and Community Arts Practice: Guiding Principles for Facilitating Healing, Health and Wellbeing

“…Such an approach, which spans intersections of gender, age, and culture, requires arts and health professionals to respect and hold space for multiple aspects of diversity including gender fluidity and expansive cultural understandings of human spirituality and wellbeing beyond physical health (Eckersley, 2007;Wobcke, 2015). Doing so, responds to growing evidence of the intergenerational effects of mothers' childhood and during-pregnancy-trauma on their babies and children (Tu, Skalkidou, Lindskog & Gredebäck, 2021). Edwards (2017) argued for creative arts therapy professionals to adopt trauma informed approaches to working with all people.…”

Attentional control is a stable construct in infancy but not steadily linked with self-regulatory functions in toddlerhood.

“… Note. This figure is reprinted from “Maternal Childhood Trauma and Perinatal Distress Are Related to Infants’ Focused Attention From 6 to 18 Months,” by H. F. Tu, A. Skalkidou, M. Lindskog, and G. Gredebäck, 2021, Scientific Reports, 11 (1) (https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-03568-2).…”