The influence of motherhood on neural systems for reward processing in low income, minority, young women.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

Given the association between maternal caregiving behavior and heightened neural reward activity in experimental animal studies, the present study examined whether motherhood in humans positively modulates reward-processing neural circuits, even among mothers exposed to various life stressors and depression.

Methods

Subjects were 77 first-time mothers and 126 nulliparous young women from the Pittsburgh Girls Study, a longitudinal study beginning in childhood. Subjects underwent a monetary reward task during functional magnetic resonance imaging in addition to assessment of current depressive symptoms. Life stress was measured by averaging data collected between ages 8-15 years. Using a region-of-interest approach, we conducted hierarchical regression to examine the

SUBMITTER: Moses-Kolko EL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4788565 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature