Maternal anxiety during pregnancy is associated with weaker prefrontal functional connectivity in adult offspring.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The connectome, constituting a unique fingerprint of a person's brain, may be influenced by its prenatal environment, potentially affecting later-life resilience and mental health.

Methods

We conducted a prospective resting-state functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging study in 28-year-old offspring (N = 49) of mothers whose anxiety was monitored during pregnancy. Two offspring anxiety subgroups were defined: "High anxiety" (n = 13) group versus "low-to-medium anxiety" (n = 36) group, based on maternal self-reported state anxiety at 12-22 weeks of gestation. To predict resting-state functional connectivity of 32 by 32 ROIs, maternal state anxiety during pregnancy was included as a predictor in general linear models for both ROI-to-ROI and graph theoretical metrics.

SUBMITTER: Turk E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10733226 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature