Mothers’ neural response to valenced infant interactions predicts postnatal depression and anxiety

Finnegan, Megan Kate

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/108252 Copy

Description

Title

Mothers’ neural response to valenced infant interactions predicts postnatal depression and anxiety

Author(s)

Finnegan, Megan Kate

Issue Date

2020-04-17

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

• Heller, Wendy
• Laurent, Hiedemarie

Department of Study

Psychology

Discipline

Psychology

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

M.S.

Degree Level

Thesis

Keyword(s)

• mother
• depression
• anxiety
• internalizing
• fMRI
• longitudinal

Abstract

It is currently unknown whether differences in neural responsiveness to infant cues observed in perinatal affective disturbance are specific to depression/anxiety or are better attributed to a common component of internalizing distress. It is also unknown whether differences in mothers’ brain response can be accounted for by effects of past episodes, or if current neural processing of her child may serve as a risk factor for development of future symptoms. Twenty-four mothers from a community-based sample participated in an fMRI session viewing their 3-month- old infant during tasks evoking positive or negative emotion. They were tracked across the ensuing 15 months to monitor changes in affective symptoms. Past and current episodes of depression and anxiety, as well as future symptoms, were used to predict differences in mothers’ hemodynamic response to their infant in positive compared to negative emotion contexts. Lower relative activation in largely overlapping brain regions involving frontal lobe structures to own infant positive vs. negative emotion was associated with concurrent (3-month) depression diagnosis and prospective (3-18 month) depression and anxiety symptoms. There was little evidence for impacts of past psychopathology (more limited effect of past anxiety and nonsignificant effect of past depression). Results suggest biased maternal processing of infant emotions during postpartum depression and anxiety is largely accounted for by a shared source of variance (internalizing distress). Furthermore, differential maternal responsiveness to her infant’s emotional cues is specifically associated with the perpetuation of postpartum symptoms, as opposed to more general phenotypic or scarring effects of past psychopathology.

Graduation Semester

2020-05

Type of Resource

Thesis

Permalink

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/108252

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2020 Megan Finnegan

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