Mechanisms of Intergenerational Impact of Maternal Trauma

描述（由申请人提供）：有童年虐待史的成年人在成年后特别容易出现与压力相关的精神病理。尽管许多研究都集中在童年虐待对受虐儿童一生的长期负面影响上，但令人惊讶的是，很少有研究调查童年虐待对几代人的影响或其跨代影响的机制。研究表明，童年受到虐待的母亲的子女在成年后患与压力有关的心理障碍的风险增加，生活在压力环境中的母亲患儿童虐待、育儿受损和心理障碍的风险增加。鉴于生活在低收入城市环境中的家庭的环境压力水平升高，我们描述这些人群中创伤是如何跨代传播的尤为重要。为了解决文献中的这一差距，我们建议收集400名低收入、城市、非洲裔美国母亲及其9-12岁子女的数据。我们将在基线和基线后9个月和18个月收集数据。本研究将重点关注母亲的情感和情感调节，以及作为中间表型的母亲教养和母亲应激反应生物标志物，这些中间表型可能会增加受虐待母亲的孩子的代际风险。我们还将研究儿童暴露于创伤、邻里暴力和压力的作用。我们预计，这项研究将显著有助于发展以经验为基础的干预和预防方法，旨在提高这一人群的恢复力和降低风险。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Adults with histories of childhood abuse are particularly vulnerable to the development of stress- related psychopathology in adulthood. Although much research has focused on long-term negative sequel of childhood abuse across the lifespan of the abused child, surprisingly little research has examined the impact of childhood abuse across generations or the mechanisms of its trans-generational impact. Research demonstrates that children of mothers who were abused in childhood are at increased risk for stress related psychological disorders in adulthood and that mothers living in stressful environments are at increased risk for child maltreatment, impaired parenting and psychological disorders. Given the elevated levels of environmental stressors for families living in low-income, urban environments, it is particularly critical that we delineate how trauma is transmitted across generations in these populations. In order to address this gap in the literature, we propose to collect data on 400 low-income, urban, African American mothers and their 9-12 year old offspring. We will gather data at baseline and at 9 and 18 months post baseline. The proposed research will focus on maternal affect and affect regulation, and on maternal parenting and maternal stress response biomarkers as intermediate phenotypes that may contribute to increased intergenerational risk in children of maltreated mothers. We will also examine the role of child exposure to trauma, neighborhood violence and stress. We anticipate that this research will contribute significantly to the development of empirically grounded intervention and prevention approaches aimed at increasing resilience and decreasing risk in this population.