Stage 2 Registered Report: Epigenetic Intergenerational Transmission: Mothers' Adverse Childhood Experiences and DNA Methylation.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

Individual differences in risk for mental disorders over the lifespan are shaped by forces acting before the individual is born-in utero, but likely even earlier, during the mother's own childhood. The environmental epigenetics hypothesis proposes that sustained effects of environmental conditions on gene expression are mediated by epigenetic mechanisms. Recent human studies have shown that adversities in childhood are correlated with DNA methylation (DNAm) in adulthood. In the current study, we tested the following pre-registered hypotheses: Mothers' adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are correlated with DNAm in peripheral blood during pregnancy (hypothesis 1) and in cord blood samples from newborn infants (hypothesis 2), and women's depression and anxiety symptoms dur

SUBMITTER: Scorza P 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10594411 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature