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Maternal Prenatal Depression And Anxiety Affect Neonatal Neurobehavior, Shelby Siddall, Jason Gibbs, Aimee Martin, Nicki Aubuchon-Endsley (Mentor)

Idaho Conference on Undergraduate Research

Prenatal depression and anxiety have been linked to impaired infant neurobehavior including altered attention, responsivity, and quality of movement. No known studies have assessed individual and joint effects of prenatal depressive and anxiety on neonatal neurobehavioral outcomes. The current study compared these outcomes among (1) mothers diagnosed with comorbid Depressive and Anxiety Disorders, (2) mothers diagnosed with only Depressive Disorders, (3) mothers diagnosed with only Anxiety Disorders, and (4) mothers with no prenatal diagnosis.

Maternal prenatal diagnoses were assessed by the SCID-I. Offspring neurobehavior was assessed from 1-2 to 30 days using the NNNS. There was a between-subject's effect ( …