Young children of depressed mothers

Young children of depressed mothersLovisenberg Diaconal Hospital and Department of Psychology, University of Oslo, have studied the relation between dysfunctional regulation of stress in the young children of depressed mothers and risk for the development of later disorders.The effect of maternal depressive disorder on infant daytime cortisol production was studied in three groups of infants; one group with mothers with comorbid depression and anxiety (n=19), a second group with mothers with depression only (n=7) and a third group with non-depressed mothers (n=24). Specifically, the study addressed the following questions: 1. How is the relation between maternal depression and infant cognitive trajectories during the first 18 months of life? 2.How is maternal depression related to infants’ daytime cortisol? 3.How are the trajectories of maternal behavior related to clinical maternal depression? Infants of depressed mothers had a stable lower cognitive score over the period 6-18 months of age as compared to the infants of nondepressed mothers, and the girls tended to increase their cognitive scores more as compared to the boys over the same time period. The depressed mothers continued to report elevated depression symptoms over the follow-up. The stable negative relation between maternal depression and infant cognitive scores is discussed in light of the stability of depression symptoms over the follow-up and sex differences in cognitive development. The infants’ cortisol production pattern was measured when they were 6, 12 and 18 months old in combination with repeated measures of parenting stress and depression symptoms. The results showed that infants of mothers with comorbid depression and anxiety had relatively higher cortisol production from morning to bedtime and higher bedtime values as compared to infants of non-depressed mothers and infants of depressed only mothers when they were 6 and 12 months old, but not when 18 months old. The results were interpreted in light of possible changes in the infants’ stress regulatory capacities or changes in maternal coping strategies at infant age 18 months. The results also showed that mean maternal style over the first 18 months of infant life, and infant cognitive development at 6 months of each made an independent contribution to the prediction of infant–mother relationship when the infants were 18 months old. Depression group affiliation and infant negative reactivity showed no significant contribution to the infant-mother relationship. The lower quality of maternal parenting behavior observed over the follow-up in comorbid mothers was ascribed to the chronic elevated depression symptoms. The significantly stronger enhancement of maternal parenting among the comorbid mothers despite their chronic elevated depression symptoms was interpreted in light of the infant–mother interaction therapy that most of the comorbid mothers participated in. The significant contribution of mean maternal style and infant cognitive skills in predicting the mother–infant relationship underscores the clinical importance of supporting both the mothers’ quality of parenting behavior, as well as the infants’ cognitive skills, in order to assist high dyadic mutuality between mothers and their infants. The results suggest that infants and young children with depressive mothers are vulnerable. Specifically, children with mothers suffering from anxiety as well as depression should be followed up to later childhood and adolescence.

Young children of depressed mothersLovisenberg Diakonale sykehus og Psykologisk institutt, UiO, undersøker sammenhengen mellom dysfunksjonell stressregulering hos småbarn av depressive mødre og risiko for utvikling av senere vansker. Det mangler ekspertise innen feltet fysiologisk stressregulering hos småbarn i Norge og sårbarhet for senere vansker.En ledende internasjonal forsker innen stressregulering hos sped- og småbarn, Dr. Megan Gunnar ved Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota, var interessert i studien og inviterte PhD-kandidaten til å være gjesteforsker i Dr. Gunnar’s Psychobiology lab høsten 2010. Under oppholdet i Dr. Gunnars lab fikk kandidaten analysert data av fra studien ved barnets alder 6 og 12 måneder og diskutert funnene med Dr. Gunnar og hennes medarbeidere. Artikkel vedrørende disse data er under bearbeiding. Kandidaten fikk opplæring i Linear Mixed Modelling som er nødvendig analysestrategi av cortisol data og opplæring i psykobiologisk teori og forskning. Samarbeidet med Dr. Gunnar videreføres i analyser og tolkning av cortisol data fra barna ved 18 måneder våren 2011 da via e-post. Det ble via Dr. Gunnar etablert et samarbeid med Dr. Kathy Stansbury vedrørende skåring av prosedyren ”Still Face” mellom mor og barn. Dr. Stansbury og hennes medarbeidere skårer ”Still Face”- materialet og vil være medforfattere på artikkel. Kandidaten samarbeidet også med Dr. Margaret Tresch Owen, University of Texas, Dallas, vedrørende vurdering av kvalitet i samspill mellom barn og foreldre i studien målt ved barnas alder 6,12 og 18 måneder. Kandidaten fikk tilgang til data fra NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development hvor kvalitet i samspill er vurdert blant 1300 familier i USA. Kandidaten deltok på konferanse Marce 2010, Pittsburgh, PA, med poster hvor konklusjonen var at deprimerte mødre som vurderes som sensitive i samspill (lek), vurderer selv at de ikke er kompetente i omsorgen for barnet. Dette kan forstås som at deprimerte mødre som er sensitive i en avslappet situasjon med barnet, er bevisste på de utfordringene som ligger i det å ha ansvaret for et spedbarn når man er deprimert. Dette kan også forstås som en negativ attribusjonsstil hos de sensitive mødrene som undervurderer selv egen foreldre kompetanse.