Prenatal Social Connection and Disruption During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Effects on Maternal and Infant Health

项目总结 新冠肺炎疫情对孕妇和她们的 合伙人。遵守社交疏远准则的需要已经改变了社交 准父母之间的联系，对压力、孤独、减少在家中的机会的影响 个人产前护理和分娩支持。众所周知，怀孕期间的社会支持 缓冲压力并预测新父母和他们的婴儿更好的产后结局。 例如，更多的产前支持与降低父母患病的风险有关 产后情绪和焦虑障碍，早产和低出生的发生率较低 体重，婴儿气质更平静，婴儿发育更健康。鉴于这一证据， 大流行引发的怀孕期间社交联系的变化可能会有长期的影响 对新父母及其子女的影响。 目前的方案利用了新冠肺炎独特的自然实验 大流行以检查社会联系对母婴健康的影响 孕妇和她们的伴侣。Chirp(冠状病毒，健康，隔离和 怀孕弹性)研究于2020年春季启动，已招募了710名孕妇 报告了他们的社会联系和支持感受的父母 怀孕了。我们将在他们出生后3个月、6个月和12个月对这群人进行追踪 孩子。除了收集自我报告的数据外，我们还将收集医院出生记录以衡量 妊娠结局，以及测量神经内分泌应激暴露的头发皮质醇。我们也 计划使用地理编码对大流行的社会、经济和健康影响进行建模 并探索这些影响如何影响产后结局。我们的实验室已经收集了 来自另一组怀孕期间招募的200名准父母的数据 关于向为人父母的过渡，构成了大流行前的比较样本 同样的措施和时机。我们还将对来自我们的儿童进行为期五年的跟踪调查 大流行前的数据集，将包括行为和神经成像测量 神经发育。 我们的试点数据表明，心理痛苦的评级明显较高，而较低的 新冠肺炎疫情影响准父母的社会支持评价。我们 期待该项目将对压力和韧性的研究做出重要贡献 在怀孕期间及其对母婴健康的长期影响。

PROJECT SUMMARY The COVID-19 pandemic has had sweeping effects on pregnant women and their partners. The need to adhere to social distancing guidelines has altered the social connectedness of expectant parents, with effects on stress, loneliness, reduced access to in- person prenatal care, and childbirth support. Social support during pregnancy is known to buffer stress and predict better postpartum outcomes for both new parents and their infants. For example, greater prenatal support has been linked with decreased risk of parental postpartum mood and anxiety disorders, lower incidence of preterm birth and low birth weight, calmer infant temperament, and healthier infant development. Given this evidence, pandemic-induced changes to social connectedness during pregnancy may have long-term effects for new parents and their children. The current proposal leverages the unique natural experiment of the COVID-19 pandemic to examine the maternal and infant health effects of social connectedness among pregnant women and their partners. The CHIRP (Coronavirus, Health, Isolation and Resilience in Pregnancy) study launched in spring 2020 and has enrolled 710 expectant parents who reported on their feelings of social connectedness and support during pregnancy. We will follow up with this cohort three, six, and 12 months after the birth of their child. In addition to collecting self-report data, we will gather hospital birth charts to measure gestational outcomes, and hair cortisol to measure neuroendocrine stress exposure. We also plan to use geocoding to model the social, economic, and health impacts of the pandemic and explore how these impacts shape postpartum outcomes. Our lab has already collected data from another cohort of 200 expectant parents recruited during pregnancy and followed over the transition to parenthood, constituting a pre-pandemic comparison sample with the same measures and timing. We will also conduct a five-year follow-up with children from our pre-pandemic dataset that will incorporate behavioral and neuroimaging measures of neurodevelopment. Our pilot data indicates significantly higher ratings of psychological distress and lower ratings of social support among expectant parents affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. We expect that this project will make important contributions to the study of stress and resilience during pregnancy and its long-term effects on both maternal and infant well-being.