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Shared genes link maternal prenatal depression to child behavioral outcomes

Shared genetic factors between parent and child account for most of the connection between maternal prenatal depressive symptoms and offspring’s subsequent internalizing and externalizing issues in early childhood, according to results of analyses published in The Lancet Psychiatry.

“Maternal prenatal depression is a risk factor for early-life psychopathology in children. However, the nature of this link has not been comprehensively established, and several mechanisms are plausible,” Laurie J. Hannigan, MSc, from the Institute of Health and Wellbeing, University of Glasgow, and colleagues wrote. “A ... possible mechanism involves genetic confounding. If the same genes influence risk for prenatal depressive symptoms in mothers and internalizing or externalizing problems in young children, the link between them could be explained by genes shared intergenerationally.”

Researchers conducted analysis of a population-derived, longitudinal sample of adult sibling, half-sibling, and twin mothers and their young children to determine the importance of passive genetic transmission, direct exposure and indirect exposure in the relationship between maternal prenatal depressive symptoms and early-life psychopathology in offspring. They examined mothers’ self-reported depressive symptoms during pregnancy and their reports of offspring psychopathology symptoms during the first few years of life measured at 18, 36 and 60 months via the Child Behavior Checklist from 22,195 mothers and 35,299 children.

The findings revealed that maternal prenatal depressive symptoms were tied to offspring early-life psychopathology predominantly via intergenerationally shared genetic risk factors, which explained 41% (95% CI, 36-46) of variance in children’s internalizing problems and 37% (95% CI, 30-44) of variance in children’s externalizing problems.

Furthermore, Hannigan and colleagues found that phenotypic transmission for internalizing problems also played a significant role, accounting for 14% (95% CI, 5-19) of the connection. However, they found that this was explained by exposure to concurrent maternal depressive symptoms, rather than by direct exposure in utero.

“The finding that genetic factors associated with prenatal maternal depression account entirely for

the heritability of internalizing symptoms in their offspring might also have considerable clinical implications, because it implies that any translational insights from genome-wide studies of depression (done primarily in adult populations) should be equally applicable to emotional problems early in life,” the researchers wrote. “The results of this study emphasize the importance of rigorous control for genetic confounding when investigating potential effects of prenatal exposures.” – by Savannah Demko

Disclosure: The authors report no relevant financial disclosures.