Fetal and Infant Outcomes in the Offspring of Parents With Perinatal Mental Disorders: Earliest Influences

Mental illness is highly prevalent and runs in families. Mental disorders are considered to enhance the risk for the development of psychopathology in the offspring. This heightened risk is related to the separate and joint effects of inherited genetic vulnerabilities for psychopathology and environmental influences. The early years of life are suggested to be a key developmental phase in the intergenerational psychopathology transmission. Available evidence supports the idea that early exposure to parental psychopathology, during the pregnancy and first postpartum year, may be related to child psychological functioning beyond the postpartum period, up to adulthood years. This not only highlights the importance of intervening early to break the chain of intergenerational transmission of psychopathology but also raises the question of whether early interventions targeting parental mental disorders in this period may alleviate these prolonged adverse effects in the infant offspring. The current article focuses on the specific risk of psychopathology conveyed from mentally ill parents to the offspring during the pregnancy and first postpartum year. We first present a summary of the available evidence on the associations of parental perinatal mental illness with infant psychological outcomes at the behavioral, biological, and neurophysiological levels. Next, we address the effects of early interventions and discuss whether these may mitigate the early intergenerational transmission of risk for psychopathology. The summarized evidence supports the idea that psychopathology-related changes in parents’ behavior and physiology in the perinatal period are related to behavioral, biological, and neurophysiological correlates of infant psychological functioning in this period. These alterations may constitute risk for later development of child and/or adult forms of psychopathology and thus for intergenerational transmission. Targeting psychopathology or mother-infant interactions in isolation in the postnatal period may not be sufficient to improve outcomes, whereas interventions targeting both maternal psychopathology and mother-infant interactions seem promising in alleviating the risk of early transmission.

Introduction

The transition to parenthood is a major life event that brings profound and lasting changes in new parents’ relationships and personal identities as well as in the structure and organization of daily life. Becoming parents can be experienced as a highly rewarding but also a highly demanding task (1). The responsibilities of parenthood during the first year where infants fully depend on the caregivers can be stressful especially for parents with (predispositions for) psychopathology. This is why early parenthood is considered to be a period of vulnerability for the new onset and/or relapse of psychopathology in parents.

Among different types of psychopathology that manifest perinatally, the highest incidence rates have been reported for depression. The prevalences of pregnancy and postpartum depression range between 13% (2, 3) and 25% for mothers (4) and between 8.4% (5) and 10% for fathers (4). Anxiety disorders are also highly prevalent and commonly manifest comorbid with depression (6, 7), with incidence rates between 10% and 18% for mothers (8–10) and 5% to 10% for fathers (11, 12) during the perinatal period. Although relatively less prevalent, psychosis (13) and birth-related posttraumatic stress disorder (14) may specifically manifest following birth. Earlier research on perinatal psychopathology has almost exclusively focused on the most prevalent (i.e., depression) and the most severe (i.e., psychosis) forms of psychopathology in mothers (15, 16), whereas the presence of other mental disorders in this period have only recently been acknowledged (4, 17–19). Moreover, fathers have only recently been incorporated into the studies of perinatal mental illness. Psychopathology often co-occurs in new mothers and fathers, reflecting the influences of assortive mating (20) and the effects of living with a partner with a mental illness. The presence of psychopathology in both parents may multiply the risk of transmitting mental illness to offspring (4, 12, 21, 22). Hence, a better understanding of paternal influences, alongside and in interaction with maternal influences is of paramount importance.

The variability in the prevalence estimates across studies of perinatal mental illness in parents is partly explained by other risk factors, for example, socioeconomic disadvantages, unplanned pregnancies, low empathy, and social support from the partner and/or environment (23, 24). Furthermore, the link between parental mental illness and offspring psychopathology may mediate the effect of other disadvantages that are known to be intergenerationally transmitted, such as childhood emotional abuse and neglect in parents (25). Childhood maltreatment constitutes a lifelong risk for depression (26, 27) that may specifically manifest during transition to parenthood (28–30). Depression in parents with these adverse childhood experiences increases the risk of child maltreatment, and infants’ postnatal exposure to maternal depression and maltreatment, in turn, multiplies the risk of psychopathology in the offspring.

There is substantial continuity in perinatal psychopathology (31–33), the strongest risk factor for psychopathology during the postnatal period is prenatal psychopathology. Estimates are that over 50% of the mental disorders reported in the postnatal period are relapses of prenatal psychopathology (2, 19). Despite a clear accumulation of risk on parents with earlier mental disorder, psychopathology in new parents goes undetected almost in half of the cases (34, 35). Undetected and untreated psychopathology in this period can take a chronic form, especially in case of a previous history of mental illness. The impact on the child of chronic and recurrent psychopathology in parents, extending beyond the prepartum and postpartum period, would be more profound and present a more pronounced risk for intergenerational transmission of psychopathology (36, 37).

Along with the studies focusing on the prevalence of mental illness during the pregnancy and postnatal period in community samples, a related line of research focuses on the needs and experiences of individuals with chronic and severe mental disorders (such as psychotic disorders) in the reproductive age (38, 39). A meta-synthesis of the qualitative evidence on the early experiences of mothers with severe mental illness reveals several challenges on the way to parenthood (40). At the core, these seem to result from the inherent conflict between the desire to be a good mother as defined by society and the limitations coming from living with a severe mental illness. Mothers experience guilt over their maternal abilities and over the risk of transmitting mental illness to their child. Moreover, the stigma of mental illness seems to be enhanced in the case of motherhood, making mothers less likely to seek help for the challenges they encounter and more likely to end up feeling isolated in this period (40). Early experiences of parenthood in men with chronic or severe mental disorders still remain to be incorporated into this line of research.

Taken together, available evidence on perinatal psychopathology and on the experiences of motherhood in women with severe mental disorders clearly illustrates that the transition to parenthood is a vulnerable phase on the side of parents. The vulnerability on the side of infants, in turn, is related to the tremendous changes and fast-paced development that takes place in the infant brain in this period (41, 42). These changes are highly dependent on infants’ environmental experiences. Early experiences have the power to impact on the ongoing brain development either by altering or by moderating the developing function or structure of the infant brain (43). This sensitivity to environmental input by newborns and new parents explains why early environmental adversity including parental psychopathology may have an especially pronounced impact on infants’ development in the early years of life (44, 45). For example, prenatal exposure to parental stress in the context of depression and anxiety is linked with changes in the development of infant hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis (46, 47), and postnatal exposure to psychopathology is suggested to influence the development of the key emotional brain systems for adult emotion processing, which become functional at around the first year of life (48–50).

Studies on the relationship between mental illness in parents and psychological functioning in the offspring have been categorized broadly into a micro versus macro perspective (44). Within the context of the perinatal period, the micro perspective focuses on the immediate associations of parental prenatal and/or postnatal mental illness with infant development, with a specific focus on aspects of early psychological functioning that may play a role in later psychopathology. The macro perspective, in turn, focuses on the longitudinal measurement of psychopathology in the offspring of parents with perinatal mental disorder over time intervals that extend from infancy up till adulthood.

Available evidence from the macro perspective reveals that parental psychopathology in the perinatal period may be related to child functioning beyond early years. At least in some cases, this link holds after taking into account later psychopathology in parents. This would reflect the specific influence of both genetically inherited dispositions for psychopathology and early environmental influences related to being exposed to a parent with mental illness in utero and in early life. To illustrate with the most studied mental disorder, i.e., maternal depression, studies reveal a significant link between exposure to maternal depression during pregnancy and the first postpartum year, and psychological functioning in the offspring from infancy to adulthood years. For example, infants of mothers with prenatal depression show more internalizing and externalizing problems at 1 year of age (51). Children of mothers with postnatal depression show more behavioral problems at the age of 2 (52), and of 5 and beyond (53, 54), along with a higher (up to fourfold to fivefold) risk of mental disorders such as depression and anxiety at 11 (55), 13 (56), and 16 years of age (57). There is also some evidence revealing similar effects of fathers’ depression (58, 59), and parents’ anxiety disorders in this period on child outcomes (60–62). Other studies have revealed more modest estimates of this link and have highlighted the importance of incorporating the chronicity of parental mental illness and other risk factors into this line of research (55, 63–67). Thus, further research is needed before we can reach firm conclusions about distinct associations of parental mental disorder at the perinatal period with later psychopathology in the offspring, whereas the evidence accrued so far from the macro perspective points to a link between offsprings’ early exposure to parental psychopathology and later development of psychopathology. This highlights the importance of intervening early to break the chain of intergenerational transmission of psychopathology. As suggested by the antenatal investment hypothesis, the earlier the interventions are, the higher the returns would be in terms of economic and social benefits (68).

The findings from the macro perspective illustrate the need to observe early processes that are potential precursors to psychopathology in the offspring of mentally ill parents over the course of development from a micro perspective. The aims of this current review focusing on the immediate infant psychological outcomes from the micro perspective are twofold. The first is to gain insight in the effects of parental perinatal mental illness on early functioning by providing an overview of the associations of parental mental illness with infant psychological outcomes at the behavioral (see the section Behavioral Pathways: The Relationship Between Parental Perinatal Mental Disorder and Early Indices of Infant Psychobehavioral Functioning), biological (see the section Biological Pathways: The Links Between Parental Prenatal Mental Disorder and Early Indices of Infant Psychobiological Functioning), and neurophysiological levels (see the section Neurophysiological Pathways: The Links Between Parental Perinatal Mental Disorder and Early Neurophysiological Indices of Infant Psychological Functioning). The second aim is to answer the question of whether early interventions may mitigate the early intergenerational transmission of risk for psychopathology (see the section Effect of Early Interventions on Parent and Infant Outcomes).

Parental Perinatal Mental Disorder and Infant Outcomes

Behavioral Pathways: The Relationship Between Parental Perinatal Mental Disorder and Early Indices of Infant Psychobehavioral Functioning

Infants’ socio-emotional development is dynamically shaped throughout the first year as a result of their exposure to emotional expressions in everyday interactions. Indices of psycho-behavioral functioning at this period therefore focus on infants’ interactive behavior with their caregiver. Mental illness in parents in the first postnatal year seems to alter parents’ behavior in terms of affect expressions, attention, and sensitivity during these early interactions.

Parental Mental Illness and Parents’ Behavior and Affect in Early Interactions

Psychopathology in parents may interfere with parents’ experience and perceptions of their infant and alter parents’ behavior in everyday interactions with their child. Depressed and anxious mothers were observed to be less responsive and/or less sensitive to child signals than mothers without depression or anxiety during early interactions (69–72). Depressed mothers also display more neutral and negative, and less positive affect during their interactions with their infant (73). Moreover, evidence suggests that depression in parents is related to suboptimal amounts of stimulation in everyday activities; for example, depressed parents less often read, sing to, or play with their infants (72). Differently from depressed parents, anxious parents do not differ from reference parents in their positive or negative facial expressions during early interactions (74). Anxious parents, in turn, were reported to display “exaggerated behavior” which is defined by high intensity and frequency of gaze, facial expressions, and vocalizations that are inappropriate with regard to timing and content (75). Moreover, parents with diagnoses of social anxiety were found to show more anxious behavior during their interactions with a stranger in the presence of their infants (76, 77), while parents with panic disorder reported expressing more anger to their infants in disciplinary contexts (78).

The differences in parents’ emotional expressions and sensitivity are at least partly explained by psychopathology-related changes in parents’ perceptions of their child: For example, parents with depression were found to perceive their child as more negative (79) and to be less likely to detect happy facial expressions of their infants than parents without depression (80). Concerning parenting, depressed mothers’ behavior to their infant was classified as intrusive and overcontrolling on one end and withdrawn and understimulating on the other end of the continuum (81, 82). Withdrawn-depressed parents with depression were described to be less engaged and less tuned-in to their child during everyday interactions. Intrusive-depressed parents, in turn, seem to exert more control during play and intervene more frequently with their child’s exploration of novel stimuli (82). The withdrawn-depressed parenting style has been linked with an underresponsive physiological profile that is characterized by lower dopamine levels and higher right-frontal EEG activity than the intrusive-depressed style (83–85). These differences were proposed to reflect the behavioral inhibition (BI) and activation systems (83). On a parallel vein, the history of maltreatment in parents seems to indirectly contribute to nonoptimal patterns of parenting, which manifests as more negative and intrusive, as well as harsher parenting practices and less parental emotional availability (86–90). Thus, parents’ earlier negative experiences may at least partially explain the observed relationship between parents’ depression and parents’ negative perceptions of their child, and parenting practices (91).

Earlier evidence has also revealed a relationship between generalized anxiety symptoms and a more intrusive parenting style in parents with infants, along with less challenging parenting (92). Decreased levels of challenging parenting in anxious parents were proposed to be related to anxious parents’ reduced ability to encourage their child’s approach/exploration of potentially unsafe situations and to the development of child anxiety (93, 94). Findings from few studies that investigated parental behavior in early parent-infant interactions in parents with more severe mental disorders such as schizophrenia revealed that psychopathology-related alterations in mothers’ early interactive behavior are especially pervasive in the case of severe mental illness. For example, mothers with schizophrenia were found to be less sensitive, less responsive, and more withdrawn to their infant as compared to parents with affective disorders (95, 96). The effect of these psychopathology-related alterations in parents’ experience, perception, and responses to their child is suggested to be especially pronounced in the first postnatal year (48, 97).

Parental Mental Illness and Infant Expression and Regulation of Emotions in Early Face-to-Face Interactions

Psychopathology-related changes in their behavior and affect in early interactions may hamper parents’ ability to provide the optimal affective environment for infants’ emotional development. Theories of early socio-emotional development assign an important role to parents’ emotional expressions and regulation of emotions, as well as to affective synchrony (98, 99). Infants were shown to be highly sensitive to parental affective input at the first postnatal year: Studies in community samples reveal that they tune in to the subtle differences between their mothers’ and fathers’ expressions of affect in these interactions (100). Although infants have some primitive abilities to regulate negative arousal such as looking away or thumb sucking, these are highly reflexive and limited in effectiveness (101, 102). For the rest, infants highly rely on the assistance of their parents for regulating emotional experiences in negatively arousing situations. Co-regulation of infants’ emotional states in early dyadic experiences was suggested to lay the ground for the development of more voluntary emotion regulation strategies that emerge later in the first year (103).

Just like their parents, infants of depressed parents were shown to display more neutral and negative, and less positive affect than infants of reference parents during their interactions (73, 74, 104, 105) and to implement less mature emotion regulation strategies than infants of reference parents (106). Moreover, negative interactive style of depressed parents was suggested to trigger avoidance as an emotion regulation strategy: Children seem to use turning and gazing away from the mother as a strategy to regulate negative arousal possibly resulting from depressed parents’ limited sensitivity and responsivity (107). In line with this, it was found that infants of depressed parents use gaze aversion more often during their face-to-face interactions with their parents (108). Although avoidance can be seen as an adaptive strategy in response to parental depression as it would reduce infants’ exposure to parents’ negative affect, it may be less adaptive in other situations where it may restrict child’s exploration and new learning opportunities. On a parallel vein, it was suggested that due to their flat affect, limited responsibility and availability in everyday interactions, infants are less likely to actively seek input from depressed parents in ambiguous situations (109, 110).

Infants of anxious parents, in turn, more often display positive or negative expressions as compared to infants of reference parents in their face-to-face interactions with the parent (73, 111). The evidence also reveals that infants of anxious parents may express less negative affect as compared to infants of reference parents in challenging situations like meeting a stranger (75) but that they become anxious if they are first exposed to parental anxious displays before confronting the strangers (76, 77). In contrast, emotion regulation strategies of the infants of anxious parents do not seem to differ from infants of reference parents (106–108). In an earlier review on the links between exposure to parental depression and anxiety in the first postnatal year and child expressions of affect, it was suggested that infants’ displays of affect in everyday interactions in the case of parental depression and anxiety may be mirroring their parents (105): Infants who are repeatedly exposed to parents’ flat and negative affect in early face-to-face interactions may show a depressed interaction style characterized by more flat and more negative expressions. Similarly, infants exposed to parents’ anxious behavior in specific anxiety-provoking situations seem to show an anxious response characterized by avoidant tendencies in these situations as a result of modeling (76). Likewise, impairments in the parent-child early dyadic regulation of affect and the resulting difficulties in emotion regulation may constitute vulnerability for the development of psychopathology in children, especially in the presence of other vulnerabilities such as insecure attachment and difficult temperament.

Parental Mental Illness and Infant Attachment

According to attachment theory, neonates are biologically programmed to form a strong bond to their primary caregivers to ensure their survival (111). Parents’ ability to provide a timely and appropriate response to the infants’ dynamically changing attention and affective signals in everyday interactions at this period is of paramount importance for establishing a secure parent-child attachment in the early years of life (112, 113). Along with responsivity and sensitivity, parents’ mutuality and synchrony and their positive and supportive attitude during early interactions seem to be factors supporting the establishment of a secure attachment (111). It was suggested that early attachment in infants’ first relationships with the caregivers shapes one’s internal representations of relating to others. Attachment patterns show moderate stability from infancy to early adulthood years (114). Thus, although there is some room for change, infants’ attachment security in their early relationships with the parent provides the ground for later attachment behavior in personal relationships.

Infant attachment is commonly measured using the experimental paradigm the Strange Situation, which is a stressful situation involving parental separation and reunion, as well as stranger anxiety (115). The Strange Situation consists of a series of phases during which the parent leaves the child (alone or with a stranger) for a few minutes (parental separation) before she comes back and reunites with the infant (parental reunion). Several dimensions of infants’ behavior are observed during the reunion phase for measuring the attachment to caregiver, including infants’ proximity/comfort seeking versus avoidance, resistance against mothers’ attempt to contact and comfort them, and their emotional expressions. Securely attached infants express distress in response to maternal separation and positively embrace the reunion, while infants with resistant attachment experience stronger levels of stress in response to separation and show conflictual reactions to parental reunion, characterized by an approach to the parent for comfort, along with a resistance against it. In turn, infants with an avoidant attachment style do not seem to be distressed by maternal separation and/or interested to engage with the mother during the reunion.

A third pattern of insecure attachment, so-called disorganized/disoriented attachment, was later defined by Main and Solomon (116). Children with disorganized attachment overtly show disoriented/disorganized reactions to maternal separation and reunion episodes in the Strange Situation. These children show not only contradictory behavior (such as approaching the parent while averting gaze) and apprehension to the caregiver but also uncommon and out-of-context behavior such as freezing, sudden change in affect, fearful reactions to caregiver, and/or incomplete movements or atypical postures (117). Infants with disorganized attachment were suggested to seek contact with the primary caregiver, without a consistent or coherent strategy to establish that contact (116). It was suggested that at the core of the disorganized attachment style is a difficulty to trust and rely on parents for comfort and soothing. This may potentially be a result of repeated exposure to insensitive or disruptive parenting behavior (including frightening or frightened parental reactions) that is ineffective at meeting infants’ needs for proximity and comfort in stressful situations (118).

Earlier evidence has revealed that these insensitive and disruptive parenting behaviors may occur as a result of unresolved traumatic experiences including parents’ history of childhood maltreatment. In fact, more than half of the parents of infants with disorganized attachment were shown to have such unresolved trauma (119). In the case of childhood maltreatment, the links between earlier maternal trauma and security of parent-child attachment seem to be mediated by postnatal maternal depression (120). Infants’ exposure to parents’ postnatal depression and stress during early interactions seems to be linked to a lower likelihood of a secure attachment, along with a higher risk for insecure attachment (121–123). Moreover, higher rates of disorganized attachment were reported in the infants of mothers with borderline personality disorder (124). It is important to note that the association between parental mental illness and child attachment is rather modest in size and was not replicated in some of the more recent studies [for example, the link between parental psychopathology and disorganized attachment was not significant in the case of depression (125, 126), and in the case of anxiety (127, 128)]. Note, however, that most of the presented findings from these earlier studies are from community samples, whereas the association between parental mental illness and disorganized attachment would be especially pronounced in clinical samples of parents [for a more elaborate discussion, see Ref. (129)]. Although limited by similar methodological issues, a significant relationship between early insecure attachment and the development of internalizing and externalizing psychopathology from early childhood to adulthood years was reported in earlier studies (130, 131). To summarize, there is preliminary support for the idea that psychopathology-related alterations in parents’ behavior may be related to higher levels of insecure attachment in the offspring, which constitutes a vulnerability for intergenerational transmission of psychopathology. Further evidence from clinical samples of parents with infants is needed to reach firm conclusions about this link between parental psychopathology and insecure attachment.

Section Summary and Conclusions

Taken together, the evidence summarized in this section reveals a significant link between parental mental illness and parents’ parenting behaviors, and their expression and regulation of affect during early interactions. These psychopathology-related alterations may limit parents’ emotional availability and their ability to respond to their infant in a sensitive manner, rendering the early socio-emotional environment suboptimal for the establishment of a secure attachment bond, as well as for infants’ emotional development. Available evidence from infants of parents with anxiety and depression reveal that infants’ behavior during these early interactions, defined by high levels of affective negativity and avoidance, along with less mature emotion regulation skills, is reminiscent of the interaction and responses characterizing parents’ psychopathology. On the behavioral level, it seems that parents may already pass on negative interaction patterns characterizing affective psychopathology during these early interactions.

Long-term implications of the early suboptimal environment linked to perinatal parental mental health problems include a negative-insecure relational pattern that may be internalized and generalized to the offspring’s new relationships with teachers, peers, and romantic partners. The offspring may additionally face the risk of repeating early suboptimal relational experiences by choosing mentors, friends, and partners who behave in similar ways as the parent with psychopathology. Finally, the offspring of parents with perinatal mental disorders may adopt less functional emotional regulation strategies such as self-destructive behaviors, aggression, depression, or avoidance and may experience more difficulty regulating their negative emotions.

Biological Pathways: The Links Between Parental Prenatal Mental Disorder and Early Indices of Infant Psychobiological Functioning

The first environment that a human being experiences is inside the mother’s womb. Research in the last decades has shown that this environment can have a great impact on the development of the embryo and fetus (132–135). The fetal programming hypothesis (136, 137) postulates that the environment of the developing fetus affects its development to enhance survival and prepares the infant for the environment to expect after birth. In the context of parental mental health, the mental state of the mother during pregnancy may influence the prenatal as well as the postnatal environment of the unborn child, thereby affecting its development. In this section, we discuss some of the possible mechanisms by which prenatal parental mental health may influence the development of the unborn child, with a focus on infant psychobiological development. We will mostly focus on maternal mental health during pregnancy with the womb as the first (biological) environment, even though fathers may directly and indirectly influence the environment of mother, and thereby her offspring. Furthermore, as mental illnesses co-occur with high levels of stress, and most research in this field is conducted on prenatal depression and anxiety, this section will focus on consequences of (traumatic) stress, depression, and anxiety during the prenatal period.

Human studies have shown that stress during pregnancy has widespread associations with offspring cognitive, emotional, and health outcomes (132–135). Studies in this area differentiate between different types of stress. That is, some studies investigate the impact of traumatic stressors that have happened during the prenatal period and that can be relatively objectively identified, such as having been exposed to the holocaust, the 9/11 attacks (138, 139), and natural disasters (140). Alternatively, some studies investigate the levels of stress that are subjectively experienced during pregnancy, either due to impactful events as mentioned above (141), due to daily life hassles, or due to the pregnancy itself (142, 143). Yet other studies examine more trait- or disorder-related experiences of stress, anxiety and depression (144). In this regard, studies in women that have developed or suffered from posttraumatic stress disorder or depression during the prenatal period often also focus on changes in stress physiology that are associated with these disorders in mothers (138, 145). Irrespective of the type of stress, most of the studies on prenatal stress indicate worse developmental outcomes with problems in the cognitive domain, emotional reactivity, and worse physical health outcomes. In this section we will discuss possible routes via which this psychobiological functioning of the infant can be affected by prenatal stress.

As human studies lack the possibility of randomly assigning stress during pregnancy to assess its impact, it is bound by the constraints of observational designs, and views differ on the origins of prenatal stress effects (137). However, studies that examine traumatic events that happened to a large group of people, such as a natural disaster, have the opportunity to more objectively compare women that have and have not suffered from these stressors. Animal studies on the other hand use experimental procedures, ranging from physical constraint to overcrowding, to induce prenatal stress (146). These studies are able to more directly examine causal effects of prenatal stress, independent of predisposing heritable characteristics or postnatal care, and give the opportunity to more precisely examine the potential underlying mechanisms by which prenatal stress may affect the prenatal environment of the fetus. Both human and animal studies comparing pregnancies with high levels of stress versus those with low levels of stress have given us insights in the psychobiological effects of prenatal stress and anxiety, some of which will be discussed next.

The Links of Parental Mental Illness to Infant Psychobiological Development

Recent studies show that prenatal stress and mental health problems in mothers are associated with differential brain development in children (147), although studies in young infants are still rare (148). Some first studies in infants show associations between maternal prenatal depression and amygdala microstructure and functional connectivity in early infancy (149–151) and between maternal prenatal stress and amygdala functional connectivity in preterm neonates (152). Maternal prenatal anxiety has also been found to associate with infant brain microstructures and hippocampal growth (150, 151). Studies in rats complement these studies by showing that these effects can have a causative origin. Indeed, using restraint stress procedures or corticosterone administration in rats has been shown to affect brain morphology and behavior (146, 152).

One line of reasoning is that many of the effects of prenatal stress, anxiety, and depression on infant functioning and brain development are related to changes in the development of the infant HPA axis (153). The HPA axis plays a role in biological stress regulation, where brain areas like the hippocampus and prefrontal cortex are key brain areas regulating these stress responses, and is implicated in cognitive and emotional functioning (154). Quite a few human and animal studies show dysregulations in the HPA axis in relation to prenatal stress (46, 47). Both hyporeactivity and hyperreactivity of the HPA axis have been found in response to prenatal stress, and the effects seem to depend on timing and the type of the stress during pregnancy, time and type of HPA axis measurements, and child sex. For example, we showed that maternal prenatal anxiety was associated with heightened cortisol reactivity to a bathing session at 2 weeks of age but decreased cortisol reactivity to a vaccination at 2 months of age (142), showing moderation by time and type of stress induction. Brennan et al. (155) revealed that maternal prenatal depression was associated with increased baseline infant cortisol levels, while comorbidity with anxiety disorder was related to higher infant cortisol reactivity, showing differential effects on infant outcomes dependent on maternal disorder-specific symptoms. There are furthermore indications that females may be more susceptible to the impact of prenatal stress on HPA axis regulation (46).

Overall, the literature suggests that the HPA axis may be a key player in the association between prenatal stress and developmental outcomes, but longitudinal human studies showing proof for this pathway are still limited (156). From an evolutionary perspective, and according to the fetal programming hypotheses, prenatal stress would prepare the offspring for a stressful, dangerous, or hostile environment to grow up in. Changes in infant HPA axis regulation would thereby prepare for this environment. However, in case the postnatal environment is different than may be expected based on the first experiences, this can lead to a so-called mismatch in environments (157), in which the prenatal developmental changes do not lead to higher changes of survival but may induce susceptibility to pathology (47). While fetal programming has become an important area of research (136), the underlying mechanisms implicated in fetal programming still remain to be fully elucidated, and at different stages during pregnancy different mechanisms may play a role.

A Potential Mechanism: Prenatal Stress Hormones

One area that has been studied extensively in the context of prenatal stress, anxiety, and depression is the influence of maternal stress hormones, most notably cortisol, on the developing fetus. Maternal cortisol levels can directly influence fetal cortisol levels via the placenta or via stimulation of the infant HPA axis by placental corticotropin-releasing hormones (158, 159). While the fetus is in principle protected from high maternal cortisol concentrations by the placental enzyme 11β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase-type 2 (11β-HSD2), this enzyme is found to be inhibited by prenatal anxiety (160), reducing its protection against maternal cortisol. Heightened levels of cortisol during fetal development may in turn affect infant HPA axis regulation and brain development (161, 162). Besides changes in stress hormones, maternal prenatal stress or mental health problems may affect the unborn child in several other ways, including changes in inflammatory and metabolic conditions of the intrauterine environment (163). These endocrinological changes may be dependent on lifestyle factors (e.g., exercise, sleep, and nutrition) that could be direct consequences of heightened levels of stress, anxiety, or depression in the mother (132).

While the prenatal environment may be affected in many ways by changes in maternal hormones, and immune and/or metabolic status, in recent years the focus has shifted to underlying epigenetic mechanisms that may ultimately explain changes in the development of the fetus (135, 163, 164). Epigenetics refers to modifications to the genome that have functional consequences for gene functionality, without changing nucleotide sequences (165). The most common studied epigenetic factor in human research is DNA methylation, which is sensitive to glucocorticoid signaling (166). Epigenetic changes due to cortisol provide a route by which the prenatal environment can impact fetal development, as epigenetic changes due to prenatal stress hormones can directly impact gene activity and functionality during development of the fetal brain and HPA axis (167, 168). Interestingly, not only maternal stress but also paternal prenatal stress has been studied in this context. While paternal stress may impact maternal stress levels via behavioral and social routes, it has been suggested that stress in males can also lead to epigenetic changes in the sperm that can be directly transmitted to the offspring (169).

As discussed above, prenatal stress, anxiety, and depression affect the intrauterine environment and thereby the development of the fetus. However, these factors do not act alone and may interact with, or even represent, underlying genetic characteristics. First of all, the effects of maternal stress and mood can interact with genetic susceptibility of the unborn child (170). For example, child brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) genotype was found to moderate effects of maternal prenatal anxiety on later child internalizing problem behavior (171), as well as on the child’s epigenome and structures of the amygdala and the hippocampus (172). Secondly, an infant’s genetic susceptibility to emotional or developmental problems will depend on the genes of the parents. In that regard, associations between maternal and/or paternal stress, anxiety, and depression and infant development may partly be due to inherited characteristics (173). As such, dysregulations in the HPA axis of children may very well be directly inherited from the mother, possibly confounding previously discussed associations with prenatal stress. Similarly, the emotional development of children may depend on parental mental health via genetic routes. An interesting study by Rice at al. (173) has tried to disentangle some of these effects by comparing children that were born via in vitro fertilization (IVF), who were genetically either related or unrelated to the mother. They showed that prenatal stress affected birth outcomes and antisocial behavior independent of mother-child genetic relatedness, indicating prenatal stress as an environmental factor. Likewise, maternal anxiety and depression related to offspring anxiety levels held independent of relatedness. However, associations with symptoms of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder were only present in related pairs and hence implies underlying heritable factors (173). Such clever designs can give a more clear understanding of cause and effect when examining associations between prenatal or postnatal stress and infant outcomes.

So far, we have focused on mechanisms during the pregnancy. Obviously, prenatal stress may also be associated with changes in postnatal care, e.g., with regard to sensitive behavior or emotional availability, and hence affect infant development as well (132, 174); see the section Behavioral Pathways: The Relationship Between Parental Perinatal Mental Disorder and Early Indices of Infant Psychobehavioral Functioning. Furthermore, prenatal and postnatal mood disruptions in mothers can interact or have additive effects on child outcomes (137, 175, 176). In human studies, it is again hard to disentangle effects of the prenatal and postnatal environment, as each may have a different or continuous impact or reflect more underlying characteristics. Here as well, animal studies can guide in disentangling these environments by experimentally manipulating either prenatal or postnatal environment, and by cross-fostering studies (177).

Section Summary and Conclusions

In this section we show the importance of the first biological environment that the offspring experiences, i.e., the womb. Mothers’ prenatal stress and mental health status will influence the amount and diversity of hormones and metabolites that permeate the placenta and can thereby directly impact the development of the infant brain and physiology. These changes may be long lasting due to epigenetic changes that can permanently alter the phenotypic expressions of the infant, including heightened stress sensitivity and changes in HPA axis regulation. The long-term implications of these early alterations in infant psychophysiologic and biological functioning may go beyond heightened stress sensitivity and subsequent risk for mental disorders (e.g., anxiety, depression) as it also alters immunity and the brain-gut axis underpinning risk for somatic disorders (e.g., autoimmune diseases) later in development. However, it is important to note that these underlying mechanistic explanations need translational research in animals, as observational designs in humans limit our abilities to draw conclusions regarding the causality of observed associations between changes in parental and offspring psychobiology.

Neurophysiological Pathways: The Links Between Parental Perinatal Mental Disorder and Early Neurophysiological Indices of Infant Psychological Functioning

An accumulating body of evidence illustrates that infants of mothers with mental illness are more likely to develop dysregulated behavior, lower levels of positive affect/behavior, and higher levels of externalizing and internalizing behavior (178, 179). From a developmental psychopathology perspective, child externalizing and internalizing behavior can be partly explained by individuals’ inability to regulate their emotions appropriately (180). Two physiological and neural indices play an important role in individuals’ emotion functioning. One is vagal tone, indexed by the respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA). Vagal activity is related to individuals’ facial expressions and to the process of physiological regulation during social engagement (181, 182). The second neural index is related to the amygdala: An enlarged amygdala or heighted connectivity between amygdala and other brain structures is related to heightened negative emotionality and affective disorders (151, 183, 184). In this section of the review, the focus is on the links between maternal mental illness and child’s physiological functioning as indexed by RSA and amygdala structure or amygdala connectivity.

Parental Mental Illness and Infant RSA

One of the underlying mechanisms explaining parent-to-offspring transmission of maternal depression and anxiety may be related to the activity in the parasympathetic system (178, 179). Recent evidence from experimental and correlational studies supports this idea (185–187). Activities in the parasympathetic system are usually indexed by vagal tone. The vagus nerve is part of the motor pathway that is connected to striated facial muscles that are responsible for social gaze, facial expression, and vocalization, supporting successful social engagement (182). RSA has been used to measure the functional output of the vagal pathway on the heart (190). It refers to the variability in heart rate that occurs at the frequency of spontaneous respiration. Higher baseline RSA is an index of flexible responding (191) and is linked to better self-regulation (192) and better sustained and focused attention (188, 189). However, higher baseline RSA is also found to be related to greater behavioral reactivity (193) and heightened frustration (192).

The prenatal period and the first year of life are critical periods for the maturation of the vagal system (182, 194), which is indexed by the number of myelinated vagal fibers. Without a working myelinated vagus, more rudimentary defensive strategies such as fight-flight mobilization, tantrum, and shutdown behavior will dominate rather than regulate social behaviors (182). The myelinated vagal fibers keep burgeoning in number, and the myelin thickness continues to increase from 24 weeks through adolescence; however, the greatest increase is observed from 30–32 weeks of gestational age to approximately 6–9 months postpartum (195, 196). Thus, maternal psychopathology [for example, maternal depression reflected in flat affect, unresponsiveness, and low sensitivity (197)] may exert a stronger effect during this stage than later in development.

Infants of mothers who experience prenatal or postnatal depression were shown to be more likely to exhibit lower baseline RSA as early as neonates (84, 198). Infants of mothers with postnatal depression also do not show the usual increase in RSA that is observed from 3 to 6 months in typical development (198). Similar findings were reported in infants of mothers with anxiety disorders (either during lifetime or during pregnancy (199, 200). Low baseline RSA poses several disadvantages for infants (181). Given its connection to the striated facial muscles, the nonoptimal vagal development may impede infants’ ability to signal or express their emotions, which in turn may increase infants’ risk of developing affective disorders (181, 201). Observational studies support this view such that newborns of depressed (versus nondepressed) mothers showed fewer facial expressions in response to happy and surprised facial expressions (202) (also see the section Behavioral Pathways: The Relationship Between Parental Perinatal Mental Disorder and Early Indices of Infant Psychobehavioral Functioning). Moreover, lower baseline RSA levels limit infants’ ability to engage in physiological regulation (203). Taken together, evidence generally supports the idea that infants who have depressed and/or anxious mothers may have difficulty expressing emotions resulting from their nonoptimal development of RSA, and this may in turn impede their social engagement, enhancing the risk for later development of depression and anxiety.

Opposite to lower baseline RSA in infants that is generally seen as maladaptive (181), high baseline RSA is defined as a “biological sensitivity to context” factor (204, 205) such that infants with higher RSA are more susceptible to the environmental influences for better and for worse. This idea is supported by recent evidence that revealed that maternal depression and anxiety are linked to maladaptive infant outcomes (e.g., infant negativity, sleep problems, or disorganized attachment) only for infants who showed higher baseline RSA but not for infants who showed lower baseline RSA (206–208). Thus, in the context of parental mental illness, the finding that infants with higher baseline RSA demonstrate more maladaptive outcomes possibly indicates a misfit between infants’ physiology and the level of stress in the environment. Further studies are needed to elucidate the effect of baseline RSA servicing as a “biological sensitivity to context” factor (205).

Maternal Mental Illness and Infant RSA Withdrawal

Differently from the Baseline RSA that is usually seen as an index of a stable resting “physiological state” (181, 203), a decrease in RSA or RSA withdrawal reflects individuals mobilizing resources in response to immediate environmental challenges, such as dealing with a frustrating or stressful situation. This process facilitates an increase in heart rate and allows individuals to shift from maintaining internal homeostasis to coping with external demands (201). After the stressor is over, individuals usually experience a recovery that manifests an increase in RSA (201). Consistent with the theory, the process of infants’ RSA withdrawal is associated with concurrent behavioral regulation and recovery from distress (190, 209). A meta-analysis has revealed that children who were able to engage in RSA withdrawal during stressful situations had fewer externalizing, internalizing, and cognitive/academic problems; moreover, lower levels of RSA withdrawal were found in children who displayed clinically elevated behavior problems (210).

Young children have limited ability regulating their negative arousal, and the caregiver serves as an important external regulator for infants via physical contact and verbal confirmation (211). Parents who engage in sensitive and responsive parenting usually have infants engaging in optimal levels of RSA withdrawal and normative RSA recovery (212, 213). However, for parents who experience mood disorders, the dyadic coregulation process is likely to be disrupted considering that the mothers’ fatigue and depressed mood may result in inability to respond to the infants’ need in a timely and sensitive manner (104, 197, 214). Thus, infants lose the opportunities of learning to down-regulate their negative arousal, and they are more likely to develop physiological dysregulation in the long run (211). Empirical studies that considered multiple risk factors in mothers showed that infants in the high-risk group (characterized by mothers’ current mental disorder, substance use, or two or more psychosocial risk factors) showed no recovery during the reunion episode of the Still-Face Paradigm suggesting a dysregulated physiological response in infants (187). In another study, no difference was reported in RSA changes between infants of mothers with depression and the control group (215). In contrast, infants whose mothers had bipolar disorder were shown to exhibit an increase in RSA during the stressor task compared to the control group in this study, indicating nonoptimal physiological regulation during a stressful task. To sum up, there is some indirect evidence (i.e., the effect of mood disorder is not teased out) that infants of mothers with mental illness, especially mood disorders, are more likely to develop physiological dysregulation (187, 215). However, more research is needed to uncover the direct association between parental mental illness and infant physiological regulation. Finally, note that no evidence is yet available on the links between paternal mental disorders and infants’ vagal functioning. Considering that fathers’ mental illness exerts its influence on the children either directly through parenting behaviors or indirectly through negatively affecting mothers’ parenting behaviors (216–218), resulting in nonoptimal development in infants’ physiological functioning, it is important to incorporate fathers into future studies on this line of research.

Maternal Mental Illness and Amygdala Activity in Infants

The amygdala, a critical brain region in the processing of threat, is susceptible to environmental adversity in early development (219). Mothers with prenatal depression are likely to experience multiple changes physiologically that may affect fetal development such as an increased cortisol production (220, 221). The amygdala is one of the areas rich in glucocorticoid receptors in the fetus’ brain, which seems to be especially negatively affected by maternal cortisol levels (222). Increased amygdala activation in response to novelty or threat in children has been linked to higher negative emotionality (223). Furthermore, a larger amygdala in volume, strengthened amygdala connectivity, and greater right amygdala activation are all associated with an increased risk of developing affective disorders such as depression in children and adolescents (183, 184, 224, 225).

Evidence reveals prenatal depression may have a significant effect on the differences in the microstructure of the right amygdala in neonates after controlling for postnatal depression (151). More specifically, significantly lower anisotropy and axial diffusivity, which contribute to increased negative emotionality, were observed in neonates of prenatally depressed mothers (151). Furthermore, evidence supports the idea that maternal depression may also alter the amygdala connectivity in infants. Prenatal depression was shown to be linked to greater functional connectivity in the amygdala with the left temporal cortex and insula, as well as the bilateral anterior cingulated, medial orbitofrontal, and ventromedial prefrontal cortices in 6-month-old infants; these patterns are correlates of major depressive disorder in adolescents and adults (150). Therefore, the changes in the amygdala structure and amygdala connectivity may increase infants’ vulnerability of developing affective disorders and may serve as another important mechanism through which prenatal mental illness, specifically depression, is transmitted to infants (151, 226).

Section Summary and Conclusions

Physiological and neural indices serve as underlying mechanisms that may be involved in the transmission from prenatal mental illness to infants’ maladaptive functioning. Evidence from literature examining RSA and amygdala activity illustrates that infants of parents with mental illness are more likely to carry physiological risk factors such as lower baseline RSA, reduced RSA withdrawal, and heightened amygdala connectivity. In the long term, these early alterations in RSA and amygdala connectivity may, through mechanisms such as difficulties in emotional expressions, emotion regulation and threat sensitivity, may increase infants’ vulnerability of developing mental disorders such as depression and anxiety disorders. Further research on moderating influences (e.g., children’s resilience factors and parenting behavior) of the link between parental mental illness and infant physiological and neural functioning is needed before drawing conclusions on responsible mechanisms.

Effect of Early Interventions on Parent and Infant Outcomes

The findings summarized in earlier sections illustrate the potential value of early interventions targeting parents’ psychopathology and related alterations in early parent-infant interactions in the prevention of intergenerational transmission. In light of the short-term and longer-term risks associated with parental perinatal psychopathology [e.g., Refs. (52, 56, 106, 227)] interventions for parents experiencing perinatal psychopathology have focused on infant as well as parent treatment outcomes.

Here, we provide an overview of the interventions for parents with a diagnosed psychiatric disorder [so not, for example, the interventions such as (228–231), where mothers were not diagnosed with psychiatric disorders and where the intervention began before 12 months [so not, for example, Ref. (232) or (233)].

Research into interventions for parents experiencing perinatal psychiatric disorders has predominantly focused on depression, with very few exceptions [for example, a trial for mothers with bulimic eating disorders (234), a trial for mothers with postpartum OCD (235), and a trial registered, but not yet reported, for mothers with anxiety disorders during pregnancy (236); for systematic reviews and meta-analyses, see for example Refs. (237, 238)]. We focus primarily on interventions examined in randomized controlled trials (RCTs), and then only briefly address the interventions examined using less robust designs.

We must emphasize that, to our knowledge, no intervention study has focused on paternal mental disorders and infant outcomes. For over a decade, research has addressed the risks posed by paternal psychopathology (59). It appears that risk pathways from paternal postnatal depression overlap with, but are not identical to, those of depressed mothers (239). Paternal anxiety disorder has received less attention, but, in infancy and toddlerhood, fathers’ social anxiety appears to be as important as mothers’ in predicting offspring anxiety (76, 240). So, while paternal psychopathology is important, evidence from trials addressing the effect of paternal interventions has yet to be reported.

Interventions for Maternal Mental Illness

Postnatal depression has been the most frequently studied postnatal psychiatric disorder with respect to interventions to address infant outcomes. This section provides an overview of progress in the field, moving from trials examining infant outcomes where maternal postnatal depression alone was the focus of treatment, to trials where mother-infant interactions have been the treatment targets, to having both maternal postnatal depression and mother-infant interaction as the treatment targets [for systematic reviews for broader considerations (237, 238, 241)].

Maternal Postnatal Depression as the Intervention Target

Two RCTs have examined infant outcomes following treatment of maternal postnatal depression alone (242, 243). The first trial (242, 244) examined the effect of three treatments (psychodynamic psychotherapy, cognitive behavior therapy, and nondirective counseling) versus routine primary care on maternal and offspring outcomes up to 5 years. Although all three treatments were associated with improved depression symptoms compared to routine primary care at the end of treatment (18 weeks postpartum), prevalence of maternal depression diagnosis was reduced only in mothers who received brief psychodynamic psychotherapy. At 5-year follow-up, compared to routine primary care, the treatments had led to no reduction in episodes of depression (244). Regarding offspring outcomes at the end of treatment, mothers in all treatment groups reported lower levels of problems in their relationships with their offspring compared to mothers in routine primary care. Mothers facing high social adversity and receiving nondirective counseling also reported more maternal sensitivity. However, none of the interventions was associated with effects on child attachment or cognitive development compared to the control group, and no effects were found at 5 years on measures of child emotional, behavioral, and cognitive development.

The second RCT (243) tested whether improved maternal mood led to improved child outcomes. Depressed mothers were randomly allocated to either interpersonal psychotherapy (IPT, n = 60) or to a waitlist control group (n = 60), and 56 nondepressed mothers served as control group for comparison. At the end of treatment (mean average, 9 months postpartum), compared to the waitlist control, IPT was superior only in the domain of parenting stress (although this remained higher than in the nondepressed group). At 18 months postpartum, compared to the offspring of nondepressed control mothers, offspring of mothers who received treatment had more behavior problems, lower attachment security, and more negative temperament. In summary, these early RCTs suggested that treatment of maternal postnatal depression alone was inadequate to ameliorate the risk posed to offspring by maternal postnatal depression.

Mother–Infant Relationship as the Intervention Target

In light of results from interventions focused on maternal postnatal depression alone, two RCTs (245, 246) examined the effects of interventions in the context of maternal postnatal depression where the intervention target was the mother-infant relationship, not maternal postnatal depression. First, Van Doesum and colleagues (245) examined the effects of 8 to 10 sessions of home-based video feedback treatment (VFT) (n = 35) and a control treatment of three 15-min telephone sessions offering practical parenting advice (n = 36) on infant attachment and maternal sensitivity. The study did not include treatment for depression. Regarding effects on mothers’ behaviors, at the end of treatment and at 6 months follow-up, mothers in the VFT group were observed to be more sensitive and to provide more structure in their interactions with their infants compared to mothers in the control group. Regarding children’s development, at the end of treatment, children of mothers who received VFT were observed to be more responsive to their mothers and more involved in interactions when compared to offspring of mothers in the control group. At the 6 month follow-up, prevalence of secure attachment status were higher for offspring of mothers who received VFT. These results must be considered in light of possible attention effects of the intervention (8 to 10 home visits) compared to the control group (three 15-min telephone calls). At 5-year follow-up (247), no main effects of treatment were found for mothers or offspring. However, where families experienced stressful life events, children in the VFT group had fewer mother-reported child externalizing problems than children in the control group. Thus, these results suggested that early, intensive intervention focused on the mother-infant relationship could alter infant development in key domains. Moreover, for those facing further risk in light of subsequent stressful life events, possible protective effects were reported against child externalizing problems.

Second, Horowitz and colleagues (246) reported an RCT with 136 mother-infant dyads, where mothers received an intervention called Communicating and Relating Effectively (CARE) designed to teach mothers to identify, and respond sensitively to, their infant’s behavioral cues, or no treatment. All mothers were visited at home at 6 weeks, 3, 6, and 9 months postpartum for observational assessments, with the CARE group receiving additional visits at 2 and 4 months to receive the CARE intervention. Both groups improved on measures of maternal depression, mothers’ behaviors, and mother-infant interactions, but there were no significant differences between groups. It is possible that any effects of the two sessions of the CARE intervention were confounded by the attention given to the control group (that is, four home-based observational visits). Further, the mean baseline score on the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) was under 13 for both groups, suggesting that the depression was insufficiently severe to lead to adverse child outcomes. To summarize, the VFT treatment examined by Van Doesum and colleagues (245, 247) reported promising effects for infants and, at 5-year follow-up, protective effects for children who had experienced more stressful life events. Horowitz and colleagues (246) in contrast found no effect of their CARE program. While the interventions in these two trials both focused on helping depressed mothers identify and respond sensitively to their infants’ cues, the different “doses” in the two studies, 10 sessions of VFT and two sessions of CARE, might account for the inconsistent results.

In summary, studies examining interventions with their target as either maternal depression (see the section Maternal Postnatal Depression as the Intervention Target) or the mother-infant relationship (see the section Mother–Infant Relationship as the Intervention Target) have yielded little evidence of short-term benefit to offspring development and almost no benefit at longer-term follow-up. Recent evidence points to the importance of the severity and the persistence of postnatal depression as moderators of risk for adverse childhood and adolescent development (227). In the intervention studies summarized above, the severity of maternal depression (for example, a mean score on the EPDS in the mild to moderate depression range) and the timing of interventions (being completed between 4.5 and 9 months postpartum) possibly limited these studies’ ability to clarify the effects of intervention on infant development.

Maternal Postnatal Depression and Mother–Infant Relationship as the Intervention Targets

The first study to examine children’s outcomes in the context of severe and persistent maternal postnatal depression, where the mother–infant relationship was a target while mothers also received an evidence-based treatment for depression, was reported by Stein and colleagues (248). In this RCT, 144 mothers were randomly allocated to receive, at home, either video feedback therapy (VFT, with the mother–infant relationship as its target; N = 72) or Progressive Muscle Relaxation (PMR, with stress management as its target; N = 72). Concurrently, all mothers received cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) for depression at home (10 sessions between 6 and 12 months postpartum, with two booster sessions in the second postnatal year). In particular, the study examined putative mediators of children’s development in the context of postnatal depression, by attempting to use VFT to modify key maternal behaviors (sensitivity, warmth, and contingent responsiveness) which have been shown to be a) impaired in the context of postnatal depression and b) associated with adverse child outcomes (in attachment, behavioral, and cognitive domains). Regarding mothers’ parenting behaviors, groups did not differ at the end of treatment or when children were 2 years old. Regarding children’s outcomes at 2 years, development was examined in the domains of attachment, behavior, and cognitive development. In all these domains, children’s development did not differ between the two groups but was found to be comparable with normative development in nonclinical samples. Stein and colleagues proposed that, given maternal depression had remitted in over 80% of mothers by the end of the first year, and over 85% by the end of the second year, children’s developmental outcomes could be understood in the context of no exposure to maternal depression from late in the first year through to the end of their second year. Thus, intensive treatment of maternal depression up to the end of the first year together with the interventions on mother-infant interactions could be adequate to mitigate the impact of maternal postnatal depression on children’s development at 2 years.

The trials reviewed above all addressed postnatal depression. The impact on infants of interventions for prenatal depression has received relatively little attention to date. Results are promising, with significant benefits for infants from two pilot RCTs. In their pilot RCT comparing individual, home-based CBT with treatment as usual (TAU) for ante-natal depression, Netsi and colleagues (249) found no significant differences in infant outcomes by treatment. Improved prenatal depression symptoms, however, were associated with easier infant temperament and shorter infant sleep duration 2 months postnatally. Milgrom and colleagues (250) found that group CBT for prenatal depression, compared to usual care, had medium to large effects on infant self-regulation, stress reactivity, and problem solving at 9 months old. These infant outcomes were obtained even when controlling for postnatal depression symptoms. While both pilot studies provide encouraging results, as pilot studies, neither was designed to examine hypotheses regarding fetal programming effects (173). Larger trials will be required to examine the mechanisms of how treatment of prenatal depression has its impact on infant development.

So far, we have only reviewed studies reporting RCTs that specifically focused on perinatal depression. However, there are other promising early intervention studies that depressed mothers may profit from and that are worth mentioning briefly. For example, in mindfulness-based programs, parents learn to relate differently to their own psychopathology and to their child (fostering more attentive and less overreactive parenting) through meditation practices. For example, Mindfulness-based Child birthing and Parenting (251, 252), an intervention for pregnant women and their partners, is found to reduce anxiety and depression in both the pregnant women and their partners (250) who play a role in buffering or increasing stress, anxiety, and depression of the future mother during pregnancy. Another intervention for mothers with psychopathology, Mindful with your baby, targets early parenting, babies with (regulation) problems, and mother-baby interaction problems (254, 255). Mindful with your baby was shown to lead to improvements in mothers’ psychopathology, babies’ or infants’ behavior problems, and mothers’ observed parenting and the mother-child interaction.

As the literature stands, in the context of maternal perinatal depression, short-term benefits in infant development have followed successful modification of maternal parenting behaviors, with benefits for children’s development evident at 5 years of age where children had experienced stressful life events. Conversely, the impact of persistent postnatal depression on children’s development can be mitigated, but via effective treatment of depression in the first postnatal year, sustained over the second year, without modification of the maternal parenting behaviors impaired by postnatal depression (PND).

Regarding mental illnesses other than depression, literature is less well developed. For example, for mothers with a range of mental illnesses, Fonagy and colleagues (231) conducted an RCT of Parent–Infant Psychotherapy (PIP), compared to TAU, for effects on infant cognitive, language, and motor development. When compared to TAU at 12 months, PIP had no effect on infant cognitive, language, or motor development. To enhance maternal parenting and infant outcomes in the context of maternal substance abuse disorders, Pajulo and colleagues (256, 257) have developed an intervention to promote maternal reflective functioning (RF). In a case series with 34 mother-infant pairs, they reported a significant increase in maternal RF from pretreatment to posttreatment, and that better RF was negatively associated with later relapse to substance use and children being placed in foster care (257). More robust research designs are required to establish the possible effects of enhancing maternal RF in the high-risk context of substance abuse disorders for infant outcomes.

Section Summary and Conclusions

Presently, it appears that treatment of depression prenatally may have beneficial effects on infants’ self-regulation, stress reactivity, and temperament. However, postnatal interventions addressing either parental psychopathology or parent-infant relationship in isolation do not seem to significantly improve child outcomes. On the other hand, the combination of interventions targeting parental depression together with interventions on parent-infant relationship or with parental stress management show some promise in adequately limiting infants’ exposure to the disorder’s impact. It remains to be shown whether these positive effects extend beyond the end of the second postnatal year. Finally, the mechanisms via which positive infant outcomes can be achieved remain unclear. Research might fruitfully elucidate how interventions have their effects on enhancing children’s outcomes by targeting those who face risks in addition to parental perinatal psychiatric disorder. For example, in addition to parent anxiety disorders infant BI is a risk factor for Social Anxiety Disorder (258). Thus, examining whether the effects of intervention for postnatal parental anxiety differ according to infant temperament (BI or not BI) could show how an intervention impacts infants’ development [for example, via modifying one or both of postnatal anxiety disorder and BI (259)]. Effective early interventions targeting parental mental disorders and the parent-infant relationship may have a profound beneficial impact on the development of the child up to adulthood in many ways. Potentially such effects may even impact the next generation, as parenting experiences will affect future parenting behavior. As reflected in the focus of this intervention section, we require interventions for other psychiatric disorders and for fathers experiencing perinatal psychiatric disorders.

Discussion

The current review provided a snapshot of the period between pregnancy and the first postnatal year among parents with mental disorders and their children by focusing first on the links between parental mental illness and behavioral, biological, and neurophysiological correlates of infant psychological functioning in this period. Next, to provide insight to the question of whether interventions may help to reduce or reverse this link, we focused on the effects of early interventions targeting parental mental illness (and/or) parenting on infants’ psychological outcomes. The summarized evidence provides preliminary support for the idea that parental psychopathology may limit parents’ ability to provide an optimal environment for the offspring’s emotional and physiological development in this sensitive period where parents’ synchrony, responsivity, affect expression, and regulation lays the necessary ground for healthy development in infants. The evidence further suggests that these psychopathology-related changes in parents’ behavior and biology in the perinatal period may be related to significant alterations in brain development and to behavioral, biological, physiological, and neural correlates of infant psychological functioning in this period. The accompanying changes in infants’ behavioral, biological, neural, and physiological profile seem to be reminiscent of the responses characterizing parents’ psychopathology. For example, infants of depressed parents express less emotion and engage less in positive interactions, show lower vagal tone, stronger right frontal EEG activation, and elevated cortisol levels. These altered profiles in themselves may constitute risk for later development of child and/or adult forms of psychopathology and thus for intergenerational transmission.

These findings highlight the essential value of early interventions to alleviate the transmission of psychopathology risk from mentally ill parents to their infant. Although targeting depression or mother-infant interactions in isolation may not be sufficient in the postnatal period, intensive interventions targeting depression earlier, i.e., prenatally, and or more intensively—along with mother-infant interactions—may be promising in alleviating the risk of early transmission. It is important to underline that these early infant psychological profiles that are related to parental mental illness summarized in this article are only probabilistically related to later development of psychopathology and may not fully account for the intergenerational transmission of psychopathology. In fact, not all children of mentally ill parents develop psychopathology or maladaptive outcomes. From a developmental psychopathology perspective, psychopathology in the offspring of mentally ill parents at a given point in development emerges as a result of complex and dynamic interactions between risk and resilience factors operating at the psychological, biological, and social levels of influence up to that point (260). Later adaptation/maladaptation of the offspring certainly depends on further adversity or opportunities that may either aggravate or alleviate the transmitted risk in early development (97, 260, 261). Finally, as child characteristics such as BI start to play an increasingly pronounced role from infancy onwards (262), the bidirectional nature of the associations between parent and child outcome is important to consider in familial transmission.

Although our focus was exclusively on parental mental illness as a risk factor for psychopathology in this review, the inherent complexity of multiple risk/resilience factors and mechanisms that dynamically operate in the development of psychopathology in the offspring makes it necessary to consider the influence of other factors along with parental mental illness and the interventions. These factors include more proximal influences related to the characteristics of the parent [such as history of childhood abuse (90, 91)], the child [such as temperament or BI (258, 262) and gender (140)], the couple [such as coparenting (263) and marital satisfaction (264)], and the more distal influences regarding the family and culture and broader socio-economic determinants. Future studies that incorporate these factors in longitudinal designs in mentally ill parents from pregnancy up to the point where child psychopathology develops will be essential for a more complete understanding of intergenerational transmission.

Moreover, it is important to evaluate the conclusions in view of the limitations coming from the scope of the parental mental disorders addressed by the evidence, as well as by the methodological limitations inherent to the study designs. The summarized evidence predominantly comes from depression, followed by anxiety and traumatic stress, whereas this is likely to change, now that there is an increased recognition of the fact that all disorders along the diagnostic spectrum may manifest during pregnancy and the postnatal period in mothers and fathers (4, 17–19). Methodologically speaking, the reported associations between parental mental illness and infant outcomes are from semi-experimental designs, which preclude any causal inferences. The longitudinal designs therefore provide a unique advantage in establishing a timeline between infants’ exposure to parental mental illness and the corresponding alterations in infant outcomes. Finally, methodological limitations are related to the chronic nature and continuity of parental psychopathology from the prenatal period onwards, which make it difficult to delineate the prenatal influence from postnatal and postnatal influence from later effects of psychopathology.

Finally, we note that, despite substantial psychopathology among (future) fathers, and taking into account that most children are raised by two parents, a mother and a father, most studies on the role of parental psychopathology and interventions focused on mothers, disregarding the various roles that parents play directly (for example, through exposure to paternal mental illness) and indirectly (for example, via buffering or increasing the psychopathology-related stress in the mother or in the triad). Future studies will need to elucidate these influences by including fathers or co-parents in their future research designs.

Final Conclusion and Implications

The available evidence reviewed in the current study leaves no doubt about the importance of reaching men and women with a mental health problem who become parents or who are planning or expecting to become parents as early as possible. A recent meta-synthesis on the factors that prevent women with mental illness to reach out to healthcare services for support during the pregnancy and postnatal year provides insight to the potential ways of enhancing the use of healthcare services and reducing the isolation that mothers experience on the way to and/or in the early phases of parenthood (265). First, the stigma and fears about the loss of custody can be reduced via informing the general public on the broader scale and this specific group on a smaller scale about the high prevalence of mental illness in this period and about the possibilities of alleviating the effect of parental mental illness on the parent and the child. Second, it seems that providing some stability on who delivers the care and integrating the services such that the different components can be delivered by the same professionals who are open and accessible to share psychological needs may largely improve the experience of healthcare among individuals with mental illness. Third, a nonjudgmental and compassionate approach and a readiness to provide the needed information by health professionals have been highlighted as important qualities that may facilitate the help-seeking of men and women with mental illness for healthcare services in the perinatal period. Finally, putting an equal weight on the parents’ and the baby’s needs and involving the parents with mental health problems in the decision-making process related to medical and psychological treatment are of golden value in providing an optimal healthcare environment that parents with mental health problems may turn to whenever needed.

Author Contributions

EA wrote the first drafts of the sections Introduction and Discussion, Final Conclusion and Implications and authored the section Behavioral Pathways: The Relationship between Prental Perinatal Mental Disorder and Early Indices of Infant Psychobehavioral Functioning. MT, JQ, and PL authored the sections: Biological Pathways: The Links Between Parental Prenatal Mental Disorder and Early Indices of Infant Psychobiological Functioning, Neurophysiological Pathways: The links Between Parental Perinatal Mental Disorder and Early Indices of Infant Neurophysiological Functioning, and Effect of Early Interventions on Parent and Infant Outcomes, respectively. BE and SB provided advice on the scope, structure, and content of the manuscript and contributed to the writing and revisions of the sections Introduction, Discussion and Final Conclusion and Implications. All authors contributed to manuscript revision and read and approved the submitted version.

Funding

The contribution of EA was supported by the Dutch National Science Foundation (Rubicon grant number 446-16-021).

Conflict of Interest Statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to Professor Joanne Nicholson for her kind invitation to contribute to this special section.

References

1. Nomaguchi KM, Milkie MA. Costs and rewards of children: the effects of becoming a parent on adults’ lives. J Marriage Fam (2003) 65(2):356–74. doi: 10.1111/j.1741-3737.2003.00356.x

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

2. Gotlib IH, Whiffen VE, Mount JH, Milne K, Cordy NI. Prevalence rates and demographic characteristics associated with depression in pregnancy and the postpartum. J Consult Clin Psychol (1989) 57(2):269–74. doi: 10.1037/0022-006X.57.2.269

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

3. O’hara MW, Swain AM. Rates and risk of postpartum depression—a meta-analysis. Int Rev Psychiatry (1996) 8(1):37–54. doi: 10.3109/09540269609037816

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

4. Paulson JF, Bazemore SD. Prenatal and postpartum depression in fathers and its association with maternal depression: a meta-analysis. JAMA (2010) 303(19):1961–9. doi: 10.1001/jama.2010.605

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

5. Cameron EE, Sedov ID, Tomfohr-Madsen LM. Prevalence of paternal depression in pregnancy and the postpartum: an updated meta-analysis. J Affect Disord (2016) 206:189–203. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2016.07.044

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

6. Falah-Hassani K, Shiri R, Dennis CL. Prevalence and risk factors for comorbid postpartum depressive symptomatology and anxiety. J Affect Disord (2016) 198:142–7. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2016.03.010

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

7. Skouteris H, Wertheim EH, Rallis S, Milgrom J, Paxton SJ. Depression and anxiety through pregnancy and the early postpartum: an examination of prospective relationships. J Affect Disord (2009) 113(3):303–8. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2008.06.002

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

8. Dennis CL, Falah-Hassani K, Shiri R. Prevalence of antenatal and postnatal anxiety: systematic review and meta-analysis. Br J Psychiatry (2017) 210(5):315–23. doi: 10.1192/bjp.bp.116.187179

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

9. Goodman JH, Chenausky KL, Freeman MP. Anxiety disorders during pregnancy: a systematic review. J Clin Psychiatry (2014) 75(10):e1153–84. doi: 10.4088/JCP.14r09035

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

10. Figueiredo B, Conde A. Anxiety and depression in women and men from early pregnancy to 3-months postpartum. Arch Womens Ment Health (2011) 14(3):247–55. doi: 10.1007/s00737-011-0217-3

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

11. Matthey S, Barnett B, Howie P, Kavanagh DJ. Diagnosing postpartum depression in mothers and fathers: whatever happened to anxiety? J Affect Disord (2003) 74(2):139–47. doi: 10.1016/S0165-0327(02)00012-5

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

12. Teixeira C, Figueiredo B, Conde A, Pacheco A, Costa R. Anxiety and depression during pregnancy in women and men. J Affect Disord (2009) 119(1–3):142–8. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2009.03.005

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

13. VanderKruik R, Barreix M, Chou D, Allen T, Say L, Cohen LS. The global prevalence of postpartum psychosis: a systematic review. BMC Psychiatry (2017) 17(1):272. doi: 10.1186/s12888-017-1427-7

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

14. Grekin R, O’Hara MW. Prevalence and risk factors of postpartum posttraumatic stress disorder: a meta-analysis. Clin Psychol Rev (2014) 34(5):389–401. doi: 10.1016/j.cpr.2014.05.003

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

15. Lazaratou H, Magklara K, Kourtzi A. Infants of mentally ill mothers—a mini review. Int J Sci Res (2018) 7(2):63–65. doi: 10.15373/22778179

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

16. Murray L, Cooper P, Hipwell A. Mental health of parents caring for infants. Arch Womens Ment Health (2003) 6(2):s71–7. doi: 10.1007/s00737-003-0007-7

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

17. Howard LM, Molyneaux E, Dennis CL, Rochat T, Stein A, Milgrom J. Non-psychotic mental disorders in the perinatal period. Lancet (2014) 384(9956):1775–88. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(14)61276-9

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

18. Meltzer-Brody S, Howard LM, Bergink V, Vigod S, Jones I, Munk-Olsen T, et al. Postpartum psychiatric disorders. Nat Rev Dis Primers (2018) 4:18022. doi: 10.1038/nrdp.2018.22

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

19. Vesga-Lopez O, Blanco C, Keyes K, Olfson M, Grant BF, Hasin DS. Psychiatric disorders in pregnant and postpartum women in the United States. Arch Gen Psychiatry (2008) 65(7):805–15. doi: 10.1001/archpsyc.65.7.805

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

20. Mathews CA, Reus VI. Assortative mating in the affective disorders: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Compr Psychiatry (2001) 42(4):257–62. doi: 10.1053/comp.2001.24575

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

21. Bijl RV, Cuijpers P, Smit F. Psychiatric disorders in adult children of parents with a history of psychopathology. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol (2002) 37(1):7–12. doi: 10.1007/s127-002-8208-8

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

22. Goodman JH. Paternal postpartum depression, its relationship to maternal postpartum depression, and implications for family health. J Adv Nurs (2004) 45(1):26–35. doi: 10.1046/j.1365-2648.2003.02857.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

23. Fisher J, Mello MC, Patel V, Rahman A, Tran T, Holton S, et al. Prevalence and determinants of common perinatal mental disorders in women in low-and lower-middle-income countries: a systematic review. Bull World Health Organ (2012) 90:139–49. doi: 10.2471/BLT.11.091850

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

24. Lancaster CA, Gold KJ, Flynn HA, Yoo H, Marcus SM, Davis MM. Risk factors for depressive symptoms during pregnancy: a systematic review. Am J Obstet Gynecol (2010) 202(1):5–14. doi: 10.1016/j.ajog.2009.09.007

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

25. Yang MY, Font SA, Ketchum M, Kim YK. Intergenerational transmission of child abuse and neglect: effects of maltreatment type and depressive symptoms. Child Youth Serv Rev (2018) 91:364–71. doi: 10.1016/j.childyouth.2018.06.036

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

26. Widom CS, DuMont K, Czaja SJ. A prospective investigation of major depressive disorder and comorbidity in abused and neglected children grown up. Arch Gen Psychiatry (2007) 64(1):49–56. doi: 10.1001/archpsyc.64.1.49

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

27. Norman RE, Byambaa M, De R, Butchart A, Scott J, Vos T. The long-term health consequences of child physical abuse, emotional abuse, and neglect: a systematic review and meta-analysis. PLoS Med (2012) 9(11):e1001349. doi: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1001349

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

28. Alvarez-Segura M, Garcia-Esteve L, Torres A, Plaza A, Imaz ML, Hermida-Barros L, et al. Are women with a history of abuse more vulnerable to perinatal depressive symptoms? A systematic review. Arch Womens Ment Health (2014) 17(5):343–57. doi: 10.1007/s00737-014-0440-9

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

29. Choi KW, Sikkema KJ. Childhood maltreatment and perinatal mood and anxiety disorders: a systematic review. Trauma Violence Abuse (2016) 17(5):427–53. doi: 10.1177/1524838015584369

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

30. Pawlby S, Hay D, Sharp D, Waters CS, Pariante CM. Antenatal depression and offspring psychopathology: the influence of childhood maltreatment. Br J Psychiatry (2011) 199(2):106–12. doi: 10.1192/bjp.bp.110.087734

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

31. Grant KA, McMahon C, Austin MP. Maternal anxiety during the transition to parenthood: a prospective study. J Affect Disord (2008) 108(1–2):101–11. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2007.10.002

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

32. Robertson E, Grace S, Wallington T, Stewart DE. Antenatal risk factors for postpartum depression: a synthesis of recent literature. Gen Hosp Psychiatry (2004) 26(4):289–95. doi: 10.1016/j.genhosppsych.2004.02.006

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

33. Heron J, O’Connor TG, Evans J, Golding J, Glover V, Study Team ALSPAC. The course of anxiety and depression through pregnancy and the postpartum in a community sample. J Affect Disord (2004) 80(1):65–73. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2003.08.004

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

34. Kelly RH, Zatzick DF, Anders TF. The detection and treatment of psychiatric disorders and substance use among pregnant women cared for in obstetrics. Am J Psychiatry (2001) 158(2):213–9. doi: 10.1176/appi.ajp.158.2.213

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

35. Seeley S, Murray L, Cooper PJ. The outcome for mothers and babies of health visitor intervention. Health Visit (1996) 69(4):135–8.

Google Scholar

36. Vliegen N, Casalin S, Luyten P. The course of postpartum depression: a review of longitudinal studies. Harv Rev Psychiatry (2014) 22(1):1–22. doi: 10.1097/HRP.0000000000000013

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

37. Ashman SB, Dawson G, Panagiotides H. Trajectories of maternal depression over 7 years: relations with child psychophysiology and behavior and role of contextual risks. Dev Psychopathol (2008) 20(1):55–77. doi: 10.1017/S0954579408000035

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

38. Howard LM, Kumar R, Thornicroft G. Psychosocial characteristics and needs of mothers with psychotic disorders. Br J Psychiatry (2001) 178(5):427–32. doi: 10.1192/bjp.178.5.427

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

39. Nau ML, Peterson AM. Chronic mental illness in pregnancy and postpartum. In: Barnes DL, editor. Women’s reproductive mental health across the lifespan. Cham: Springer (2014). p. 123–39. doi: 10.1007/978-3-319-05116-1_7

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

40. Wilson L, Crowe M. Parenting with a diagnosis bipolar disorder. J Adv Nurs (2009) 65(4):877–84. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2648.2008.04954.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

41. Mrzljak L, Uylings HB, Van Eden GG, Judáš M. Neuronal development in human prefrontal cortex in prenatal and postnatal stages. Prog Brain Res (1991) 85:185–222. doi: 10.1016/S0079-6123(08)62681-3

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

42. Rice D, Barone Jr S. Critical periods of vulnerability for the developing nervous system: evidence from humans and animal models. Environ Health Perspect (2000) 108(suppl 3):511–33. doi: 10.1289/ehp.00108s3511

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

43. Fox SE, Levitt P, Nelson CA III. How the timing and quality of early experiences influence the development of brain architecture. Child Dev (2010) 81(1):28–40. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2009.01380.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

44. Jones I, Chandra PS, Dazzan P, Howard LM. Bipolar disorder, affective psychosis, and schizophrenia in pregnancy and the post-partum period. Lancet (2014) 384(9956):1789–99. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(14)61278-2

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

45. Stein A, Pearson RM, Goodman SH, Rapa E, Rahman A, McCallum M, et al. Effects of perinatal mental disorders on the fetus and child. Lancet (2014) 384(9956):1800–19. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(14)61277-0

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

46. Carpenter T, Grecian SM, Reynolds RM. Sex differences in early-life programming of the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis in humans suggest increased vulnerability in females: a systematic review. J Dev Orig Health Dis (2017) 8(2):244–55. doi: 10.1017/S204017441600074X

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

47. van Bodegom M, Homberg JR, Henckens MJ. Modulation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis by early life stress exposure. Front Cell Neurosci (2017) 11:87. doi: 10.3389/fncel.2017.00087

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

48. Leppänen JM. Neural and developmental bases of the ability to recognize social signals of emotions. Emot Rev (2011) 3(2):179–88. doi: 10.1177/1754073910387942

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

49. Leppänen JM, Nelson CA. Tuning the developing brain to social signals of emotions. Nat Rev Neurosci (2009) 10(1):37. doi: 10.1038/nrn2554

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

50. Apter G, Bobin A, Genet MC, Gratier M, Devouche E. Update on mental health of infants and children of parents affected with mental health issues. Curr Psychiatry Rep (2017) 19(10):19–72. doi: 10.1007/s11920-017-0820-8

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

51. Gerardin P, Wendland J, Bodeau N, Galin A, Bialobos S, Tordjman S, et al. Depression during pregnancy: is the developmental impact earlier in boys? A prospective case-control study. J Clin Psychiatry (2011) 72(3):378–87. doi: 10.4088/JCP.09m05724blu

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

52. Avan B, Richter LM, Ramchandani PG, Norris SA, Stein A. Maternal postnatal depression and children’s growth and behaviour during the early years of life: exploring the interaction between physical and mental health. Arch Dis Child (2010) 95(9):690–5. doi: 10.1136/adc.2009.164848

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

53. Grace SL, Evindar A, Stewart DE. The effect of postpartum depression on child cognitive development and behavior: a review and critical analysis of the literature. Arch Womens Ment Health (2003) 6(4):263–74. doi: 10.1007/s00737-003-0024-6

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

54. Murray L, Sinclair D, Cooper P, Ducournau P, Turner P, Stein A. The socioemotional development of 5-year-old children of postnatally depressed mothers. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (1999) 40(8):1259–71. doi: 10.1017/S002196309900476X

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

55. Pawlby S, Sharp D, Hay D, O’Keane V. Postnatal depression and child outcome at 11 years: the importance of accurate diagnosis. J Affect Disord (2008) 107(1–3):241–5. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2007.08.002

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

56. Halligan SL, Murray L, Martins C, Cooper PJ. Maternal depression and psychiatric outcomes in adolescent offspring: a 13-year longitudinal study. J Affect Disord (2007) 97(1–3):145–54. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2006.06.010

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

57. Murray L, Arteche A, Fearon P, Halligan S, Goodyer I, Cooper P. Maternal postnatal depression and the development of depression in offspring up to 16 years of age. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2011) 50(5):460–70. doi: 10.1016/j.jaac.2011.02.001

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

58. Ramchandani PG, O’Connor TG, Evans J, Heron J, Murray L, Stein A. The effects of pre-and postnatal depression in fathers: a natural experiment comparing the effects of exposure to depression on offspring. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2008) 49(10):1069–78. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2008.02000.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

59. Ramchandani P, Psychogiou L. Paternal psychiatric disorders and children’s psychosocial development. Lancet (2009) 374(9690):646–53. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(09)60238-5

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

60. Glasheen C, Richardson GA, Fabio A. A systematic review of the effects of postnatal maternal anxiety on children. Arch Womens Ment Health (2010) 13(1):61–74. doi: 10.1007/s00737-009-0109-y

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

61. Glasheen C, Richardson GA, Kim KH, Larkby CA, Swartz HA, Day NL. Exposure to maternal pre- and postnatal depression and anxiety symptoms: risk for major depression, anxiety disorders, and conduct disorder in adolescent offspring. Dev Psychopathol (2013) 25(4pt1):1045–63. doi: 10.1017/S0954579413000369

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

62. O’Connor TG, Heron J, Golding J, Beveridge M, Glover V. Maternal antenatal anxiety and children’s behavioural/emotional problems at 4 years: report from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children. Br J Psychiatry (2002) 180(6):502–8. doi: 10.1192/bjp.180.6.502

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

63. Hay DF, Pawlby S, Waters CS, Sharp D. Antepartum and postpartum exposure to maternal depression: different effects on different adolescent outcomes. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2008) 49(10):1079–88. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2008.01959.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

64. Velders FP, Dieleman G, Henrichs J, Jaddoe VW, Hofman A, Verhulst FC, et al. Prenatal and postnatal psychological symptoms of parents and family functioning: the impact on child emotional and behavioural problems. Eur Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2011) 20(7):341–50. doi: 10.1007/s00787-011-0178-0

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

65. Brand SR, Brennan PA. Impact of antenatal and postpartum maternal mental illness: how are the children? Clin Obstet Gynecol (2009) 52(3):441–55. doi: 10.1097/GRF.0b013e3181b52930

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

66. Pearson RM, Evans J, Kounali D, Lewis G, Heron J, Ramchandani PG, et al. Maternal depression during pregnancy and the postnatal period: risks and possible mechanisms for offspring depression at age 18 years. JAMA Psychiatry (2013) 70(12):1312–9. doi: 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2013.2163

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

67. Sanger C, Iles JE, Andrew CS, Ramchandani PG. Associations between postnatal maternal depression and psychological outcomes in adolescent offspring: a systematic review. Arch Womens Ment Health (2015) 18(2):147–62. doi: 10.1007/s00737-014-0463-2

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

68. Doyle O, Harmon CP, Heckman JJ, Tremblay RE. Investing in early human development: timing and economic efficiency. Econ Hum Biol (2009) 7(1):1–6. doi: 10.1016/j.ehb.2009.01.002

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

69. Bernard K, Nissim G, Vaccaro S, Harris JL, Lindhiem O. Association between maternal depression and maternal sensitivity from birth to 12 months: a meta-analysis. Attach Hum Dev (2018) 28:1–22. doi: 10.1080/14616734.2018.1430839

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

70. Ierardi E, Ferro V, Trovato A, Tambelli R, Crugnola CR. Maternal and paternal depression and anxiety: their relationship with mother-infant interactions at 3 months. Arch Womens Ment Health (2018) 19:1–7. doi: 10.1007/s00737-018-0919-x

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

71. Milgrom J, Westley DT, Gemmill AW. The mediating role of maternal responsiveness in some longer term effects of postnatal depression on infant development. Infant Behav Dev (2004) 27(4):443–54. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2004.03.003

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

72. Paulson JF, Dauber S, Leiferman JA. Individual and combined effects of postpartum depression in mothers and fathers on parenting behavior. Pediatrics (2006) 118(2):659–68. doi: 10.1542/peds.2005-2948

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

73. Campbell SB, Cohn JF, Meyers T. Depression in first-time mothers: mother-infant interaction and depression chronicity. Dev Psychol (1995) 31(3):349. doi: 10.1037//0012-1649.31.3.349

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

74. Aktar E, Colonnesi C, de Vente W, Majdandžić M, Bögels SM. How do parents’ depression and anxiety, and infants’ negative temperament relate to parent–infant face-to-face interactions? Dev Psychopathol (2017) 29(3):697–710. doi: 10.1017/S0954579416000390

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

75. Kaitz M, Maytal HR, Devor N, Bergman L, Mankuta D. Maternal anxiety, mother–infant interactions, and infants’ response to challenge. Infant Behav Dev (2010) 33(2):136–48. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2009.12.003

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

76. Aktar E, Majdandžić M, de Vente W, Bögels SM. The interplay between expressed parental anxiety and infant behavioural inhibition predicts infant avoidance in a social referencing paradigm. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2013) 54(2):144–56. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2012.02601.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

77. Murray L, De Rosnay M, Pearson J, Bergeron C, Schofield E, Royal-Lawson M, et al. Intergenerational transmission of social anxiety: the role of social referencing processes in infancy. Child Dev (2008) 79(4):1049–64. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2008.01175.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

78. Warren SL, Gunnar MR, Kagan J, Anders TF, Simmens SJ, Rones M, et al. Maternal panic disorder: infant temperament, neurophysiology, and parenting behaviors. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2003) 42(7):814–25. doi: 10.1097/01.CHI.0000046872.56865.02

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

79. Field T, Morrow C, Adlestein D. Depressed mothers’ perceptions of infant behavior. Infant Behav Dev (1993) 16(1):99–108. doi: 10.1016/0163-6383(93)80031-3

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

80. Arteche A, Joormann J, Harvey A, Craske M, Gotlib IH, Lehtonen A, et al. The effects of postnatal maternal depression and anxiety on the processing of infant faces. J Affect Disord (2011) 133(1–2):197–203. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2011.04.015

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

81. Field T, Hernandez-Reif M, Diego M. Intrusive and withdrawn depressed mothers and their infants. Dev Rev (2006) 26(1):15–30. doi: 10.1016/j.dr.2005.04.001

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

82. Hart S, Jones NA, Field T, Lundy B. One-year-old infants of intrusive and withdrawn depressed mothers. Child Psychiatry Hum Dev (1999) 30(2):111–20. doi: 10.1023/A:1021902418770

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

83. Field T, Diego MA, Dieter J, Hernandez-Reif M, Schanberg S, Kuhn C, et al. Depressed withdrawn and intrusive mothers’ effects on their fetuses and neonates. Infant Behav Dev (2001) 24(1):27–39. doi: 10.1016/S0163-6383(01)00066-2

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

84. Jones NA, Field T, Fox NA, Davalos M, Lundy B, Hart S. Newborns of mothers with depressive symptoms are physiologically less developed. Infant Behav Dev (1998) 21(3):537–41. doi: 10.1016/S0163-6383(98)90027-3

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

85. Jones NA, Field T, Fox NA, Lundy B, Davalos M. EEG activation in 1-month-old infants of depressed mothers. Dev Psychopathol (1997) 9(3):491–505. doi: 10.1017/S0954579497001260

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

86. Banyard VL. The impact of childhood sexual abuse and family functioning on four dimensions of women’s later parenting. Child Abuse Negl (1997) 21(11):1095–107. doi: 10.1016/S0145-2134(97)00068-9

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

87. Dubowitz H, Black MM, Kerr MA, Hussey JM, Morrel TM, Everson MD, et al. Type and timing of mothers’ victimization: effects on mothers and children. Pediatrics (2001) 107(4):728–35. doi: 10.1542/peds.107.4.728

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

88. DiLillo D, Damashek A. Parenting characteristics of women reporting a history of childhood sexual abuse. Child Maltreat (2003) 8(4):319–33. doi: 10.1177/1077559503257104

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

89. Moehler E, Biringen Z, Poustka L. Emotional availability in a sample of mothers with a history of abuse. Am J Orthopsychiatry (2007) 77(4):624–8. doi: 10.1037/0002-9432.77.4.624

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

90. Fuchs A, Möhler E, Resch F, Kaess M. Impact of a maternal history of childhood abuse on the development of mother–infant interaction during the first year of life. Child Abuse Negl (2015) 48:179–89. doi: 10.1016/j.chiabu.2015.05.023

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

91. Vaillancourt K, Pawlby S, Fearon RP. History of childhood abuse and mother–infant interaction: a systematic review of observational studies. Infant Ment Health J (2017) 38(2):226–48. doi: 10.1002/imhj.21634

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

92. Möller EL, Majdandžić M, Bögels SM. Parental anxiety, parenting behavior, and infant anxiety: differential associations for fathers and mothers. J Child Fam Stud (2015) 24(9):2626–37. doi: 10.1007/s10826-014-0065-7

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

93. Bögels SM, Perotti EC. Does father know best? A formal model of the paternal influence on childhood social anxiety. J Child Fam Stud (2011) 20(2):171–81. doi: 10.1007/s10826-010-9441-0

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

94. Bögels S, Phares V. Fathers’ role in the etiology, prevention and treatment of child anxiety: a review and new model. Clin Psychol Rev (2008) 28(4):539–58. doi: 10.1016/j.cpr.2007.07.011

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

95. Wan MW, Salmon MP, Riordan DM, Appleby L, Webb R, Abel KM. What predicts poor mother–infant interaction in schizophrenia? Psychol Med (2007) 37(4):537–46. doi: 10.1017/S0033291706009172

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

96. Wan MW, Warren K, Salmon MP, Abel KM. Patterns of maternal responding in postpartum mothers with schizophrenia. Infant Behav Dev (2008) 31(3):532–8. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2008.04.003

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

97. Goodman SH, Gotlib IH. Risk for psychopathology in the children of depressed mothers: a developmental model for understanding mechanisms of transmission. Psychol Rev (1999) 106(3):458–90. doi: 10.1037//0033-295X.106.3.458

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

98. Als H, Tronick E, Brazelton TB. Analysis of face-to- face interaction in infant–adult dyads. In: Lamb ME, Suomi SJ, Stephenson GR, editors. Social interaction analysis: methodological issues. Oxford, England: U Wisconsin Press (1979). p. 33–77.

Google Scholar

99. Tronick EZ. Emotions and emotional communication in infants. Am Psychol (1989) 44(2):112–9. doi: 10.1037//0003-066X.44.2.112

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

100. Forbes EE, Cohn JF, Allen NB, Lewinsohn PM. Infant affect during parent–infant interaction at 3 and 6 months: differences between mothers and fathers and influence of parent history of depression. Infancy (2004) 5(1):61–84. doi: 10.1207/s15327078in0501_3

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

101. Cole PM, Bendezú JJ, Ram N, Chow SM. Dynamical systems modeling of early childhood self-regulation. Emotion (2017) 17(4):684–99. doi: 10.1037/emo0000268

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

102. Kopp CB. Antecedents of self-regulation: a developmental perspective. Dev Psychol (1982) 18(2):199–214. doi: 10.1037//0012-1649.18.2.199

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

103. Denham SA, Bassett HH, Wyatt T. The socialization of emotional competence. In: Grusec JE, Hastings PD, editors. Handbook of socialization: Theory and research. London and New York: Guilford Publications (2007). p. 614–37.

Google Scholar

104. Campbell SB, Matestic P, von Stauffenberg C, Mohan R, Kirchner T. Trajectories of maternal depressive symptoms, maternal sensitivity, and children’s functioning at school entry. Dev Psychol (2007) 43(5):1202. doi: 10.1037/0012-1649.43.5.1202

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

105. Aktar E, Bögels SM. Exposure to parents’ negative emotions as a developmental pathway to the family aggregation of depression and anxiety in the first year of life. Clin Child Fam Psychol Rev (2017) 20(4):369–90. doi: 10.1007/s10567-017-0240-7

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

106. Feldman R, Granat A, Pariente C, Kanety H, Kuint J, Gilboa-Schechtman E. Maternal depression and anxiety across the postpartum year and infant social engagement, fear regulation, and stress reactivity. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2009) 48(9):919–27. doi: 10.1097/CHI.0b013e3181b21651

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

107. Tronick EZ, Gianino A. Interactive mismatch and repair: challenges to the coping infant. Zero to Three (1986) 6(3):1–6.

Google Scholar

108. Granat A, Gadassi R, Gilboa-Schechtman E, Feldman R. Maternal depression and anxiety, social synchrony, and infant regulation of negative and positive emotions. Emotion (2017) 17(1):11–27. doi: 10.1037/emo0000204

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

109. Gewirtz JL, Peláez-Nogueras M. Social referencing as a learned process. In: Social referencing and the social construction of reality in infancy. Boston, MA: Springer (1992). p. 151–73. doi: 10.1007/978-1-4899-2462-9_7

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

110. Pelaez M, Virues-Ortega J, Field TM, Amir-Kiaei Y, Schnerch G. Social referencing in infants of mothers with symptoms of depression. Infant Behav Dev (2013) 36(4):548–56. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2013.05.003

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

111. Bowlby J. Attachment. Attachment and loss: vol. 1. Loss. New York: Basic Books, (1969). https://www.abebe.org.br/files/John-Bowlby-Attachment-Second-Edition-Attachment-and-Loss-Series-Vol-1-1983.pdf

Google Scholar

112. De Wolff MS, Van Ijzendoorn MH. Sensitivity and attachment: a meta-analysis on parental antecedents of infant attachment. Child Dev (1997) 68(4):571–91. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.1997.tb04218.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

113. Lucassen N, Tharner A, Van IJzendoorn MH, Bakermans-Kranenburg MJ, Volling BL, Verhulst FC, et al. The association between paternal sensitivity and infant–father attachment security: a meta-analysis of three decades of research. J Fam Psychol (2011) 25(6):986. doi: 10.1037/a0025855

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

114. Chris Fraley R. Attachment stability from infancy to adulthood: meta-analysis and dynamic modeling of developmental mechanisms. Pers Soc Psychol Rev (2002) 6(2):123–51. doi: 10.1207/S15327957PSPR0602_03

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

115. Ainsworth MD, Blehar MC, Waters E, Wall SN. Patterns of attachment: a psychological study of the strange situation. New York and London: Psychology Press (2015). doi: 10.4324/9781315802428

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

116. Main M, Solomon J. Procedures for identifying infants as disorganized/disoriented during the Ainsworth Strange Situation. In: Greenberg MT, Cicchetti D, Cummings EM, editors. The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation series on mental health and development. Attachment in the preschool years: Theory, research, and intervention. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press (1990). p. 121–60.

Google Scholar

117. Duschinsky R, Solomon J. Infant disorganized attachment: clarifying levels of analysis. Clin Child Psychol Psychiatry (2017) 22(4):524–38. doi: 10.1177/1359104516685602

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

118. Lyons-Ruth K, Bronfman E, Parsons E. Chapter IV. Maternal frightened, frightening, or atypical behavior and disorganized infant attachment patterns. Monogr Soc Res Child Dev (1999) 64(3):67–96. doi: 10.1111/1540-5834.00034

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

119. Van IJzendoorn MH. Adult attachment representations, parental responsiveness, and infant attachment: a meta-analysis on the predictive validity of the Adult Attachment Interview. Psychol Bull (1995) 117(3):387–403. doi: 10.1037//0033-2909.117.3.387

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

120. Khan M, Renk K. Understanding the pathways between mothers’ childhood maltreatment experiences and patterns of insecure attachment with young children via symptoms of depression. Child Psychiatry Hum Dev (2018) 49(6):928–40. doi: 10.1007/s10578-018-0808-6

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

121. Atkinson L, Paglia A, Coolbear J, Niccols A, Parker KC, Guger S. Attachment security: a meta-analysis of maternal mental health correlates. Clin Psychol Rev (2000) 20(8):1019–40. doi: 10.1016/S0272-7358(99)00023-9

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

122. Martins C, Gaffan EA. Effects of early maternal depression on patterns of infant–mother attachment: a meta-analytic investigation. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2000) 41(6):737–46. doi: 10.1017/S0021963099005958

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

123. Tomlinson M, Cooper P, Murray L. The mother–infant relationship and infant attachment in a South African peri-urban settlement. Child Dev (2005) 76(5):1044–54. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2005.00896.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

124. Hobson RP, Patrick M, Crandell L, García–Pérez RO, Lee A. Personal relatedness and attachment in infants of mothers with borderline personality disorder. Dev Psychopathol (2005) 17(2):329–47. doi: 10.1017/S0954579405050169

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

125. Ramsauer B, Lotzin A, Quitmann JH, Becker-Stoll F, Tharner A, Romer G. Insightfulness and later infant attachment in clinically depressed and nonclinical mothers. Infant Ment Health J (2014) 35(3):210–9. doi: 10.1002/imhj.21446

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

126. Toth SL, Rogosch FA, Sturge-Apple M, Cicchetti D. Maternal depression, children’s attachment security, and representational development: an organizational perspective. Child Dev (2009) 80(1):192–208. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2008.01254.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

127. Hughes P, Turton P, Hopper E, McGauley GA, Fonagy P. Disorganised attachment behaviour among infants born subsequent to stillbirth. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2001) 42(6):791–801. doi: 10.1111/1469-7610.00776

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

128. Hughes P, Turton P, McGauley GA, Fonagy P. Factors that predict infant disorganization in mothers classified as U in pregnancy. Attach Hum Dev (2006) 8(2):113–22. doi: 10.1080/14616730600785660

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

129. Flowers AG, McGillivray JA, Galbally M, Lewis AJ. Perinatal maternal mental health and disorganised attachment: a critical systematic review. Clin Psychol (2018) 22(3):300–16. doi: 10.1111/cp.12145

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

130. Groh AM, Fearon RP, van IJzendoorn MH, Bakermans-Kranenburg MJ, Roisman GI. Attachment in the early life course: meta-analytic evidence for its role in socioemotional development. Child Dev Perspect (2017) 11(1):70–6. doi: 10.1111/cdep.12213

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

131. Groh AM, Roisman GI, van IJzendoorn MH, Bakermans-Kranenburg MJ, Fearon RP. The significance of insecure and disorganized attachment for children’s internalizing symptoms: a meta-analytic study. Child Dev (2012) 83(2):591–610. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2011.01711.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

132. Beijers R, Buitelaar JK, de Weerth C. Mechanisms underlying the effects of prenatal psychosocial stress on child outcomes: beyond the HPA axis. Eur Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2014) 23(10):943–56. doi: 10.1007/s00787-014-0566-3

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

133. Constantinof A, Moisiadis VG, Matthews SG. Programming of stress pathways: a transgenerational perspective. J Steroid Biochem Mol Biol (2016) 160:175–80. doi: 10.1016/j.jsbmb.2015.10.008

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

134. Girchenko P, Lahti J, Czamara D, Knight AK, Jones MJ, Suarez A, et al. Associations between maternal risk factors of adverse pregnancy and birth outcomes and the offspring epigenetic clock of gestational age at birth. Clin Epigenetics (2017) 9(1):1–14. doi: 10.1186/s13148-017-0349-z

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

135. Harris A, Seckl J. Glucocorticoids, prenatal stress and the programming of disease. Horm Behav (2011) 59(3):279–89. Available from: http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0018506X10001674. doi: 10.1016/j.yhbeh.2010.06.007

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

136. Seckl JR, Meaney MJ. Glucocorticoid programming. Ann N Y Acad Sci (2004) 1032(1):63–84. doi: 10.1196/annals.1314.006

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

137. Swanson JD, Wadhwa PM. Developmental origins of child mental health disorders. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2008) 49(10):1009–19. Available from: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19017021. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2008.02014.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

138. Yehuda R, Engel SM, Brand SR, Seckl J, Marcus SM, Berkowitz GS. Transgenerational effects of posttraumatic stress disorder in babies of mothers exposed to the World Trade Center attacks during pregnancy. J Clin Endocrinol Metab (2005) 90(7):4115–8. doi: 10.1210/jc.2005-0550

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

139. Yehuda R, Halligan SL, Bierer LM. Cortisol levels in adult offspring of Holocaust survivors: relation to PTSD symptom severity in the parent and child. Psychoneuroendocrinology (2002) 27(1–2):171–80. doi: 10.1016/S0306-4530(01)00043-9

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

140. King S, Dancause K, Turcotte-Tremblay A-M, Veru F, Laplante DP. Using natural disasters to study the effects of prenatal maternal stress on child health and development. Birth Defects Res Part C Embryo Today (2012) 96(4):273–88. doi: 10.1002/bdrc.21026

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

141. Turcotte-Tremblay AM, Lim R, Laplante DP, Kobzik L, Brunet A, King S. Prenatal maternal stress predicts childhood asthma in girls: project ice storm. Biomed Res Int (2014) 2014:10. doi: 10.1155/2014/201717

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

142. Tollenaar MS, Beijers R, Jansen J, Riksen-Walraven JM, De Weerth C. Maternal prenatal stress and cortisol reactivity to stressors in human infants. Stress (2011) 14(1):53–65. doi: 10.3109/10253890.2010.499485

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

143. Buitelaar JK, Huizink AC, Mulder EJ, Robles De Medina PG, Visser GHA, Finch, et al. Prenatal stress and cognitive development and temperament in infants. Neurobiol Aging (2003) 24:S53–60. doi: 10.1016/S0197-4580(03)00050-2

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

144. Mulder EJ, De Medina PR, Huizink AC, Van den Bergh BR, Buitelaar JK, Visser GH. Prenatal maternal stress: effects on pregnancy and the (unborn) child. Early Hum Dev (2002) 70(1–2):3–14. doi: 10.1016/S0378-3782(02)00075-0

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

145. Field T, Diego M, Hernandez-Reif M. Prenatal depression effects on the fetus and newborn: a review. Infant Behav Dev (2006) 29(3):445–55. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2006.03.003

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

146. Weinstock M. Sex-dependent changes induced by prenatal stress in cortical and hippocampal morphology and behaviour in rats: an update. Stress (2011) 14(6):604–13. doi: 10.3109/10253890.2011.588294

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

147. Marečková K, Klasnja A, Bencurova P, Andrýsková L, Brázdil M, Paus T. Prenatal stress, mood, and gray matter volume in young adulthood. Cereb Cortex (2018) 29(3):1244–50. doi: 10.1093/cercor/bhy030

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

148. Buss C, Entringer S, Wadhwa PD. Fetal programming of brain development: intrauterine stress and susceptibility to psychopathology. Sci Signal (2012) 5(245):pt7. doi: 10.1126/scisignal.2003406

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

149. Posner J, Cha J, Roy AK, Peterson BS, Bansal R, Gustafsson HC, et al. Alterations in amygdala–prefrontal circuits in infants exposed to prenatal maternal depression. Transl Psychiatry (2016) 6(11):e935. doi: 10.1038/tp.2016.146

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

150. Qiu A, Anh TT, Li Y, Chen H, Rifkin-Graboi A, Broekman BF, et al. Prenatal maternal depression alters amygdala functional connectivity in 6-month-old infants. Transl Psychiatry (2015) 5(2):e508. doi: 10.1038/tp.2015.3

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

151. Rifkin-Graboi A, Bai J, Chen H, Hameed WB, Sim LW, Tint MT, et al. Prenatal maternal depression associates with microstructure of right amygdala in neonates at birth. Biol Psychiatry (2013) 74(11):837–44. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2013.06.019

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

152. Scheinost D, Kwon SH, Lacadie C, Sze G, Sinha R, Constable RT, et al. Prenatal stress alters amygdala functional connectivity in preterm neonates. Neuroimage Clin (2016) 12:381–8. doi: 10.1016/j.nicl.2016.08.010

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

153. Darnaudery M, Maccari S. Epigenetic programming of the stress response in male and female rats by prenatal restraint stress. Brain Res Rev (2008) 57(2):571–85. doi: 10.1016/j.brainresrev.2007.11.004

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

154. Maccari S, Morley-Fletcher S. Effects of prenatal restraint stress on the hypothalamus–pituitary–adrenal axis and related behavioural and neurobiological alterations. Psychoneuroendocrinology (2007) 32:S10–5. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2007.06.005

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

155. Brennan PA, Pargas R, Walker EF, Green P, Jeffrey Newport D, Stowe Z. Maternal depression and infant cortisol: influences of timing, comorbidity and treatment. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2008) 49(10):1099–107. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2008.01914.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

156. Glover V. Maternal depression, anxiety and stress during pregnancy and child outcome: what needs to be done. Best Pract Res Clin Obstet Gynaecol (2014) 28(1):25–35. doi: 10.1016/j.bpobgyn.2013.08.017

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

157. Claessens SE, Daskalakis NP, van der Veen R, Oitzl MS, de Kloet ER, Champagne DL. Development of individual differences in stress responsiveness: an overview of factors mediating the outcome of early life experiences. Psychopharmacology (2011) 214(1):141–54. doi: 10.1007/s00213-010-2118-y

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

158. Gitau R, Cameron A, Fisk NM, Glover V. Fetal exposure to maternal cortisol. Lancet (1998) 352(9129):707–8. doi: 10.1016/S0140-6736(05)60824-0

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

159. Majzoub JA, Karalis KP. Placental corticotropin-releasing hormone: function and regulation. Am J Obstet Gynecol (1999) 180(1):S242–6. doi: 10.1016/S0002-9378(99)70708-8

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

160. O’Donnell KJ, Jensen AB, Freeman L, Khalife N, O’Connor TG, Glover V. Maternal prenatal anxiety and downregulation of placental 11β-HSD2. Psychoneuroendocrinology (2012) 37(6):818–26. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2011.09.014

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

161. Davis EP, Head K, Buss C, Sandman CA. Prenatal maternal cortisol concentrations predict neurodevelopment in middle childhood. Psychoneuroendocrinology (2017) 75:56–63. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2016.10.005

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

162. Zijlmans MA, Riksen-Walraven JM, de Weerth C. Associations between maternal prenatal cortisol concentrations and child outcomes: a systematic review. Neurosci Biobehav Rev (2015) 53:1–24. doi: 10.1016/j.neubiorev.2015.02.015

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

163. Nemoda Z, Szyf M. Epigenetic alterations and prenatal maternal depression. Birth Defects Res (2017) 109(12):888–97. doi: 10.1002/bdr2.1081

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

164. Provençal N, Binder EB. The effects of early life stress on the epigenome: from the womb to adulthood and even before. Exp Neurol (2015) 268:10–20. doi: 10.1016/j.expneurol.2014.09.001

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

165. Zhang TY, Meaney MJ. Epigenetics and the environmental regulation of the genome and its function. Annu Rev Psychol (2010) 61:439–66. doi: 10.1146/annurev.psych.60.110707.163625

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

166. Zannas AS, Chrousos GP. Epigenetic programming by stress and glucocorticoids along the human lifespan. Mol Psychiatry (2017) 22(5):640. doi: 10.1038/mp.2017.35

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

167. Palma-Gudiel H, Córdova-Palomera A, Eixarch E, Deuschle M, Fananas L. Maternal psychosocial stress during pregnancy alters the epigenetic signature of the glucocorticoid receptor gene promoter in their offspring: a meta-analysis. Epigenetics (2015) 10(10):893–902. doi: 10.1080/15592294.2015.1088630

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

168. Sobolewski M, Varma G, Adams B, Anderson DW, Schneider JS, Cory-Slechta DA. Developmental lead exposure and prenatal stress result in sex-specific reprogramming of adult stress physiology and epigenetic profiles in brain. Toxicol Sci (2018) 163(2):478–89. doi: 10.1093/toxsci/kfy046

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

169. Bowers ME, Yehuda R. Intergenerational transmission of stress in humans. Neuropsychopharmacology (2016) 41(1):232–44. doi: 10.1038/npp.2015.247

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

170. Abbott PW, Gumusoglu SB, Bittle J, Beversdorf DQ, Stevens HE. Prenatal stress and genetic risk: how prenatal stress interacts with genetics to alter risk for psychiatric illness. Psychoneuroendocrinology (2018) 90:9–21. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2018.01.019

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

171. O’Donnell KJ, Glover V, Holbrook JD, O’Connor TG. Maternal prenatal anxiety and child brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) genotype: effects on internalizing symptoms from 4 to 15 years of age. Dev Psychopathol (2014) 26(4pt2):1255–66. doi: 10.1017/S095457941400100X

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

172. Chen L, Pan H, Tuan TA, Teh AL, MacIsaac JL, Mah SM, et al. Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) Val66Met polymorphism influences the association of the methylome with maternal anxiety and neonatal brain volumes. Dev Psychopathol (2015) 27(1):137–50. doi: 10.1017/S0954579414001357

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

173. Rice F, Harold GT, Boivin J, Van den Bree M, Hay DF, Thapar A. The links between prenatal stress and offspring development and psychopathology: disentangling environmental and inherited influences. Psychol Med (2010) 40(2):335–45. doi: 10.1017/S0033291709005911

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

174. Reynolds RM, Labad J, Buss C, Ghaemmaghami P, Räikkönen K. Transmitting biological effects of stress in utero: implications for mother and offspring. Psychoneuroendocrinology (2013) 38(9):1843–9. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2013.05.018

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

175. Bosch NM, Riese H, Reijneveld SA, Bakker MP, Verhulst FC, Ormel J, et al. Timing matters: long term effects of adversities from prenatal period up to adolescence on adolescents’ cortisol stress response. Psychoneuroendocrinology (2012) 37(9):1439–47. doi: 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2012.01.013

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

176. Grant KA, McMahon C, Austin MP, Reilly N, Leader L, Ali S. Maternal prenatal anxiety, postnatal caregiving and infants’ cortisol responses to the still-face procedure. Dev Psychobiol (2009) 51(8):625–37. doi: 10.1002/dev.20397

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

177. Weaver ICG, Cervoni N, Champagne FA, D’Alessio AC, Sharma S, Seckl JR, et al. Epigenetic programming by maternal behavior. Nat Neurosci (2004) 7:847–54. doi: 10.1038/nn1276

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

178. Conroy S, Pariante CM, Marks MN, Davies HA, Farrelly S, Schacht R, et al. Maternal psychopathology and infant development at 18 months: the impact of maternal personality disorder and depression. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2012) 51(1):51–61. doi: 10.1016/j.jaac.2011.10.007

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

179. Goodman SH, Rouse MH, Connell AM, Broth MR, Hall CM, Heyward D. Maternal depression and child psychopathology: a meta-analytic review. Clin Child Fam Psychol Rev (2011) 14(1):1–27. doi: 10.1007/s10567-010-0080-1

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

180. Kim J, Cicchetti D. Longitudinal pathways linking child maltreatment, emotion regulation, peer relations, and psychopathology. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2010) 51(6):706–16. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2009.02202.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

181. Field T, Diego M. Vagal activity, early growth and emotional development. Infant Behav Dev (2008) 31(3):361–73. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2007.12.008

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

182. Porges SW, Furman SA. The early development of the autonomic nervous system provides a neural platform for social behaviour: a polyvagal perspective. Infant Child Dev (2011) 20(1):106–18. doi: 10.1002/icd.688

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

183. Luking KR, Repovs G, Belden AC, Gaffrey MS, Botteron KN, Luby JL, et al. Functional connectivity of the amygdala in early-childhood-onset depression. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2011) 50(10):1027–41. doi: 10.1016/j.jaac.2011.07.019

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

184. Perlman G, Simmons AN, Wu J, Hahn KS, Tapert SF, Max JE, et al. Amygdala response and functional connectivity during emotion regulation: a study of 14 depressed adolescents. J Affect Disord (2012) 139(1):75–84. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2012.01.044

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

185. McLaughlin KA, Sheridan MA, Tibu F, Fox NA, Zeanah CH, Nelson CA. Causal effects of the early caregiving environment on development of stress response systems in children. Proc Natl Acad Sci (2015) 15:201423363. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1423363112

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

186. Perry NB, Calkins SD, Bell MA. Indirect effects of maternal sensitivity on infant emotion regulation behaviors: the role of vagal withdrawal. Infancy (2016) 21(2):128–53. doi: 10.1111/infa.12101

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

187. Suurland J, van der Heijden KB, Smaling HJ, Huijbregts SC, van Goozen SH, Swaab H. Infant autonomic nervous system response and recovery: associations with maternal risk status and infant emotion regulation. Dev Psychopathol (2017) 29(3):759–73. doi: 10.1017/S0954579416000456

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

188. Hofheimer JA, Wood BR, Porges SW, Pearson E, Lawson EE. Respiratory sinus arrhythmia and social interaction patterns in preterm newborns. Infant Behav Dev (1995) 18(2):233–45. doi: 10.1016/0163-6383(95)90052-7

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

189. Suess PE, Porges SW, Plude DJ. Cardiac vagal tone and sustained attention in school-age children. Psychophysiology (1994) 31(1):17–22. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8986.1994.tb01020.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

190. Porges SW. Physiological regulation in high-risk infants: a model for assessment and potential intervention. Dev Psychopathol (1996) 8(1):43–58. doi: 10.1017/S0954579400006969

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

191. Gyurak A, Ayduk Ö. Resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia buffers against rejection sensitivity via emotion control. Emotion (2008) 8(4):458. doi: 10.1037/1528-3542.8.4.458

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

192. Calkins SD, Dedmon SE, Gill KL, Lomax LE, Johnson LM. Frustration in infancy: implications for emotion regulation, physiological processes, and temperament. Infancy (2002) 3(2):175–97. doi: 10.1207/S15327078IN0302_4

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

193. Porges SW, Doussard-Roosevelt JA, Lourdes Portales A, Suess PE. Cardiac vagal tone: stability and relation to difficultness in infants and 3-year-olds. Dev Psychobiol (1994) 27(5):289–300. doi: 10.1002/dev.420270504

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

194. Porter CL, Bryan YE, Hsu HC. Physiological markers in early infancy: stability of 1- to 6-month vagal tone. Infant Behav Dev (1995) 18(3):363–7. doi: 10.1016/0163-6383(95)90025-X

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

195. Pereyra PM, Zhang W, Schmidt M, Becker LE. Development of myelinated and unmyelinated fibers of human vagus nerve during the first year of life. J Neurol Sci (1992) 110(1):107–13. doi: 10.1016/0022-510X(92)90016-E

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

196. Sachis PN, Armstrong DL, Becker LE, Bryan AC. Myelination of the human vagus nerve from 24 weeks postconceptional age to adolescence. J Neuropathol Exp Neurol (1982) 41(4):466–72. doi: 10.1097/00005072-198207000-00009

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

197. McFadden KE, Tamis-Lemonda CS. Maternal responsiveness, intrusiveness, and negativity during play with infants: contextual associations and infant cognitive status in a low-income sample. Infant Ment Health J (2013) 34(1):80–92. doi: 10.1002/imhj.21376

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

198. Field T, Pickens J, Fox NA, Nawrocki T, Gonzalez J. Vagal tone in infants of depressed mothers. Dev Psychopathol (1995) 7(2):227–31. doi: 10.1017/S0954579400006465

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

199. Dierckx B, Tulen JH, van den Berg MP, Tharner A, Jaddoe VW, Moll HA, et al. Maternal psychopathology influences infant heart rate variability: generation R study. Psychosom Med (2009) 71(3):313–21. doi: 10.1097/PSY.0b013e318198a82c

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

200. Field T, Diego M, Hernandez-Reif M, Schanberg S, Kuhn C, Yando R, et al. Pregnancy anxiety and comorbid depression and anger: effects on the fetus and neonate. Depress Anxiety (2003) 17(3):140–51. doi: 10.1002/da.10071

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

201. Porges SW. The polyvagal theory: phylogenetic substrates of a social nervous system. Int J Psychophysiol (2001) 42(2):123–46. doi: 10.1016/S0167-8760(01)00162-3

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

202. Lundy B, Field T, Pickens J. Newborns of mothers with depressive symptoms are less expressive. Infant Behav Dev (1996) 19(4):419–24. doi: 10.1016/S0163-6383(96)90003-X

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

203. Propper CB, Holochwost SJ. The influence of proximal risk on the early development of the autonomic nervous system. Dev Rev (2013) 33(3):151–67. doi: 10.1016/j.dr.2013.05.001

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

204. Conradt E, Measelle J, Ablow JC. Poverty, problem behavior, and promise: differential susceptibility among infants reared in poverty. Psychol Sci (2013) 24(3):235–42. doi: 10.1177/0956797612457381

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

205. Boyce WT, Ellis BJ. Biological sensitivity to context: I. Dev Psychopathol (2005) 17(2):271–301. doi: 10.1017/S0954579405050145

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

206. Gueron-Sela N, Propper CB, Wagner NJ, Camerota M, Tully KP, Moore GA. Infant respiratory sinus arrhythmia and maternal depressive symptoms predict toddler sleep problems. Dev Psychobiol (2017) 59(2):261–7. doi: 10.1002/dev.21480

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

207. Holochwost SJ, Gariépy JL, Propper CB, Mills-Koonce WR, Moore GA. Parenting behaviors and vagal tone at six months predict attachment disorganization at twelve months. Dev Psychobiol (2014) 56(6):1423–30. doi: 10.1002/dev.21221

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

208. Peltola MJ, Mäkelä T, Paavonen EJ, Vierikko E, Saarenpää-Heikkilä O, Paunio T, et al. Respiratory sinus arrhythmia moderates the impact of maternal prenatal anxiety on infant negative affectivity. Dev Psychobiol (2017) 59(2):209–16. doi: 10.1002/dev.21483

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

209. Calkins SD. Cardiac vagal tone indices of temperamental reactivity and behavioral regulation in young children. Dev Psychobiol (1997) 31(2):125–35. doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1098-2302(199709)31:2<125::AID-DEV5>3.0.CO;2-M

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

210. Graziano P, Derefinko K. Cardiac vagal control and children’s adaptive functioning: a meta-analysis. Biol Psychol (2013) 94(1):22–37. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsycho.2013.04.011

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

211. Calkins D, Leerkes EM. Early attachment processes and the development of emotional self-regulation. In: Vohs KD, Baumeister RF, editors. Handbook of self-regulation: research, theory, and applications. New York and London: Guilford Publications (2016). p. 355–73.

Google Scholar

212. Conradt E, Ablow J. Infant physiological response to the still-face paradigm: contributions of maternal sensitivity and infants’ early regulatory behavior. Infant Behav Dev (2010) 33(3):251–65. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2010.01.001

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

213. Haley DW, Stansbury K. Infant stress and parent responsiveness: regulation of physiology and behavior during still-face and reunion. Child Dev (2003) 74(5):1534–46. doi: 10.1111/1467-8624.00621

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

214. Lunkenheimer E, Tiberio SS, Skoranski AM, Buss KA, Cole PM. Parent-child coregulation of parasympathetic processes varies by social context and risk for psychopathology. Psychophysiology (2018) 55(2):e12985. doi: 10.1111/psyp.12985

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

215. Johnson KC, Brennan PA, Stowe ZN, Leibenluft E, Newport DJ. Physiological regulation in infants of women with a mood disorder: examining associations with maternal symptoms and stress. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2014) 55(2):191–8. doi: 10.1111/jcpp.12130

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

216. Hanington L, Heron J, Stein A, Ramchandani P. Parental depression and child outcomes—is marital conflict the missing link? Child Care Health Dev (2012) 38(4):520–9. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2214.2011.01270.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

217. Lavee Y, Sharlin S, Katz R. The effect of parenting stress on marital quality: an integrated mother-father model. J Fam Issues (1996) 17(1):114–35. doi: 10.1177/019251396017001007

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

218. Wilson S, Durbin CE. Effects of paternal depression on fathers’ parenting behaviors: a meta-analytic review. Clin Psychol Rev (2010) 30(2):167–80. doi: 10.1016/j.cpr.2009.10.007

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

219. Tottenham N, Sheridan MA. A review of adversity, the amygdala and the hippocampus: a consideration of developmental timing. Front Hum Neurosci (2010) 3:68. doi: 10.3389/neuro.09.068.2009

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

220. Davis EP, Glynn LM, Schetter CD, Hobel C, Chicz-Demet A, Sandman CA. Prenatal exposure to maternal depression and cortisol influences infant temperament. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2007) 46(6):737–46. doi: 10.1097/chi.0b013e318047b775

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

221. Field T, Diego M, Hernandez-Reif M. Prenatal depression effects and interventions: a review. Infant Behav Dev (2010) 33(4):409–18. doi: 10.1016/j.infbeh.2010.04.005

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

222. Herman JP, Ostrander MM, Mueller NK, Figueiredo H. Limbic system mechanisms of stress regulation: hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenocortical axis. Prog Neuropsychopharmacol (2005) 29(8):1201–13. doi: 10.1016/j.pnpbp.2005.08.006

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

223. Pérez-Edgar K, Roberson-Nay R, Hardin MG, Poeth K, Guyer AE, Nelson EE, et al. Attention alters neural responses to evocative faces in behaviorally inhibited adolescents. Neuroimage (2007) 35(4):1538–46. doi: 10.1016/j.neuroimage.2007.02.006

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

224. Rosso IM, Cintron CM, Steingard RJ, Renshaw PF, Young AD, Yurgelun-Todd DA. Amygdala and hippocampus volumes in pediatric major depression. Biol Psychiatry (2005) 57(1):21–6. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2004.10.027

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

225. Van Eijndhoven P, van Wingen G, van Oijen K, Rijpkema M, Goraj B, Verkes RJ, et al. Amygdala volume marks the acute state in the early course of depression. Biol Psychiatry (2009) 65(9):812–8. doi: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2008.10.027

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

226. Lupien SJ, Parent S, Evans AC, Tremblay RE, Zelazo PD, Corbo V, et al. Larger amygdala but no change in hippocampal volume in 10-year-old children exposed to maternal depressive symptomatology since birth. Proc Natl Acad Sci (2011) 108(34):14324–9. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1105371108

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

227. Netsi E, Pearson RM, Murray L, Cooper P, Craske MG, Stein A. Association of persistent and severe postnatal depression with child outcomes. JAMA Psychiatry (2018) 75(3):247–53. doi: 10.1001/jamapsychiatry.2017.4363

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

228. Sadler LS, Slade A, Close N, Webb DL, Simpson T, Fennie K, et al. Minding the baby: enhancing reflectiveness to improve early health and relationship outcomes in an interdisciplinary home-visiting program. Infant Ment Health J (2013) 34(5):391–405. doi: 10.1002/imhj.21406

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

229. Onozawa K, Glover V, Adams D, Modi N, Kumar RC. Infant massage improves mother–infant interaction for mothers with postnatal depression. J Affect Disord (2001) 63(1–3):201–7. doi: 10.1016/S0165-0327(00)00198-1

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

230. Roberts IS, Glover V. Postnatal depression and mother and infant outcomes after infant massage. J Affect Disord (2008) 109(1–2):189–92. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2007.10.027

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

231. Fonagy P, Sleed M, Baradon T. Randomized controlled trial of parent–infant psychotherapy for parents with mental health problems and young infants. Infant Ment Health J (2016) 37(2):97–114. doi: 10.1002/imhj.21553

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

232. Lieberman AF, Van Horn P, Ippen CG. Toward evidence-based treatment: child-parent psychotherapy with preschoolers exposed to marital violence. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2005) 44(12):1241–8. doi: 10.1097/01.chi.0000181047.59702.58

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

233. Cicchetti D, Rogosch FA, Toth SL. The efficacy of toddler-parent psychotherapy for fostering cognitive development in offspring of depressed mothers. J Abnorm Child Psychol (2000) 28(2):135–48. doi: 10.1023/A:1005118713814

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

234. Stein A, Woolley H, Senior R, Hertzmann L, Lovel M, Lee J, et al. Treating disturbances in the relationship between mothers with bulimic eating disorders and their infants: a randomized, controlled trial of video feedback. Am J Psychiatry (2006) 163(5):899–906. doi: 10.1176/ajp.2006.163.5.899

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

235. Challacombe FL, Salkovskis PM, Woolgar M, Wilkinson EL, Read J, Acheson R. A pilot randomized controlled trial of time-intensive cognitive–behaviour therapy for postpartum obsessive–compulsive disorder: effects on maternal symptoms, mother–infant interactions and attachment. Psychol Med (2017) 47(8):1478–88. doi: 10.1017/S0033291716003573

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

236. Wilkinson EL, O’Mahen HA, Fearon P, Halligan S, King DX, Greenfield G, et al. Adapting and testing a brief intervention to reduce maternal anxiety during pregnancy (ACORN): study protocol for a randomised controlled trial. Trials (2016) 17(1):156. doi: 10.1186/s13063-016-1274-8

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

237. Letourneau NL, Dennis CL, Cosic N, Linder J. The effect of perinatal depression treatment for mothers on parenting and child development: a systematic review. Depress Anxiety (2017) 34(10):928–66. doi: 10.1002/da.22687

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

238. Siegenthaler E, Munder T, Egger M. Effect of preventive interventions in mentally ill parents on the mental health of the offspring: systematic review and meta-analysis. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2012) 51(1):8–17. doi: 10.1016/j.jaac.2011.10.018

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

239. Sethna V, Murray L, Netsi E, Psychogiou L, Ramchandani PG. Paternal depression in the postnatal period and early father–infant interactions. Parenting (2015) 15(1):1–8. doi: 10.1080/15295192.2015.992732

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

240. Aktar E, Majdandžić M, De Vente W, Bögels SM. Parental social anxiety disorder prospectively predicts toddlers’ fear/avoidance in a social referencing paradigm. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2014) 55(1):77–87. doi: 10.1111/jcpp.12121

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

241. Tsivos ZL, Calam R, Sanders MR, Wittkowski A. Interventions for postnatal depression assessing the mother–infant relationship and child developmental outcomes: a systematic review. Int J Womens Health (2015) 7:429–47. doi: 10.2147/IJWH.S75311

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

242. Murray L, Cooper PJ, Wilson A, Romaniuk H. Controlled trial of the short-and long-term effect of psychological treatment of post-partum depression: 2. Br J Psychiatry (2003) 182(5):420–7. doi: 10.1192/bjp182.5.420

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

243. Forman DR, O’hara MW, Stuart S, Gorman LL, Larsen KE, Coy KC. Effective treatment for postpartum depression is not sufficient to improve the developing mother–child relationship. Dev Psychopathol (2007) 19(2):585–602. doi: 10.1017/S0954579407070289

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

244. Cooper PJ, Murray L, Wilson A, Romaniuk H. Controlled trial of the short-and long-term effect of psychological treatment of post-partum depression. Br J Psychiatry (2003) 182(5):412–9. doi: 10.1192/bjp.182.5.412

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

245. Van Doesum KT, Riksen-Walraven JM, Hosman CM, Hoefnagels C. A randomized controlled trial of a home-visiting intervention aimed at preventing relationship problems in depressed mothers and their infants. Child Dev (2008) 79(3):547–61. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2008.01142.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

246. Horowitz JA, Murphy CA, Gregory K, Wojcik J, Pulcini J, Solon L. Nurse home visits improve maternal/infant interaction and decrease severity of postpartum depression. J Obstet Gynecol Neonatal Nurs (2013) 42(3):287–300. doi: 10.1111/1552-6909.12038

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

247. Kersten-Alvarez LE, Hosman CM, Riksen-Walraven JM, Van Doesum KT, Hoefnagels C. Long-term effects of a home-visiting intervention for depressed mothers and their infants. J Child Psychol Psychiatry (2010) 51(10):1160–70. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2010.02268.x

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

248. Stein AL, Netsi E, Lawrence PJ, Granger C, Kempton C, Craske MG, et al. Mitigating the impact of persistent postnatal depression on child outcomes: a randomised controlled trial of an intervention to treat depression and improve parenting. Lancet Psychiatry (2018) 5(2):134–44. doi: 10.1016/S2215-0366(18)30006-3

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

249. Netsi E, Evans J, Wulff K, O’Mahen H, Ramchandani PG. Infant outcomes following treatment of antenatal depression: findings from a pilot randomized controlled trial. J Affect Disord (2015) 188:252–6. doi: 10.1016/j.jad.2015.08.055

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

250. Milgrom J, Holt C, Holt CJ, Ross J, Ericksen J, Gemmill AW. Feasibility study and pilot randomised trial of an antenatal depression treatment with infant follow-up. Arch Womens Ment Health (2015) 18(5):717–30. doi: 10.1007/s00737-015-0512-5

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

251. Bardacke N, Kabat-Zinn J. Mindful birthing: training the mind, body, and heart for childbirth and beyond. New York: Harper Audio (2016).

Google Scholar

252. Veringa IK, de Bruin EI, Bardacke N, Duncan LG, van Steensel FJ, Dirksen CD, et al. ‘I’ve changed my mind’, Mindfulness-Based Childbirth and Parenting (MBCP) for pregnant women with a high level of fear of childbirth and their partners: study protocol of the quasi-experimental controlled trial. BMC Psychiatry (2016) 16:377. doi: 10.1186/s12888-016-1070-8

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

253. Warriner S, Crane C, Dymond M, Krusche A. An evaluation of mindfulness-based childbirth and parenting courses for pregnant women and prospective fathers/partners within the UK NHS (MBCP-4-NHS). Midwifery (2018) 64:1–0. doi: 10.1016/j.midw.2018.05.004

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

254. Potharst ES, Aktar E, Rexwinkel M, Rigterink M, Bögels SM. Mindful with your baby: feasibility, acceptability, and effects of a mindful parenting group training for mothers and their babies in a mental health context. Mindfulness (2017) 8(5):1236–50. doi: 10.1007/s12671-017-0699-9

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

255. Zeegers MA, Potharst ES, Veringa IK, Aktar E, Goris M, Bögels SM, et al. Evaluating Mindful with Your Baby/Toddler: observational changes in maternal sensitivity, acceptance, mind-mindedness, and dyadic synchrony. Front Psychol (2019) 10:753. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00753

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

256. Pajulo M, Suchman N, Kalland M, Mayes L. Enhancing the effectiveness of residential treatment for substance abusing pregnant and parenting women: focus on maternal reflective functioning and mother-child relationship. Infant Ment Health J (2006) 27(5):448–65. doi: 10.1002/imhj.20100

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

257. Pajulo M, Pyykkönen N, Kalland M, Sinkkonen J, Helenius H, Punamäki RL, et al. Substance-abusing mothers in residential treatment with their babies: importance of pre-and postnatal maternal reflective functioning. Infant Ment Health J (2012) 33(1):70–81. doi: 10.1002/imhj.20342

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

258. Clauss JA, Blackford JU. Behavioral inhibition and risk for developing social anxiety disorder: a meta-analytic study. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2012) 51(10):1066–75. doi: 10.1016/j.jaac.2012.08.002

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

259. Kennedy SJ, Rapee RM, Edwards SL. A selective intervention program for inhibited preschool-aged children of parents with an anxiety disorder: effects on current anxiety disorders and temperament. J Am Acad Child Adolesc Psychiatry (2009) 48(6):602–9. doi: 10.1097/CHI.0b013e31819f6fa9

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

260. Sroufe LA. Considering normal and abnormal together: the essence of developmental psychopathology. Dev Psychopathol (1990) 2(4):335–47. doi: 10.1017/S0954579400005769

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

261. Murray L, Creswell C, Cooper PJ. The development of anxiety disorders in childhood: an integrative review. Psychol Med (2009) 39(9):1413–23. doi: 10.1017/S0033291709005157

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

262. Perez-Edgar K, Fox NA. Behavioral inhibition: integrating theory, research, and clinical perspectives. Cham, Switzerland: Elsevier (2018). doi: 10.1007/978-3-319-98077-5

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

263. Feinberg ME. Coparenting and the transition to parenthood: a framework for prevention. Clin Child Fam Psychol Rev (2002) 5(3):173–95. doi: 10.1023/A:1019695015110

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

264. Feldman R. Parents’ convergence on sharing and marital satisfaction, father involvement, and parent–child relationship at the transition to parenthood. Infant Ment Health J (2000) 21(3):176–91. doi: 10.1002/1097-0355(200007)21:3<176::AID-IMHJ3>3.0.CO;2-4

CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar

265. Megnin-Viggars O, Symington I, Howard LM, Pilling S. Experience of care for mental health problems in the antenatal or postnatal period for women in the UK: a systematic review and meta-synthesis of qualitative research. Arch Womens Ment Health (2015) 18(6):745–59. doi: 10.1007/s00737-015-0548-6

PubMed Abstract | CrossRef Full Text | Google Scholar