Neural mechanisms of psychological risk on mother and infant adjustment in African American and European American families

摘要 发展心理学的主要贡献之一是证明了早期照看 正常范围内的经历(即敏感的照顾)不仅有助于子女的心理和心理健康 不仅是身体健康差异，而且这种关联在整个生命过程中都持续存在。研究由The PIS和其他人已经确定了关键的母亲风险因素-抑郁症状和 依恋不安全感--破坏照料行为。然而，鉴于有证据表明 在母亲的大脑转变为母亲的过程中，存在着一个关键的缺口，即这种转变是否 作为一个敏感期，母体对婴儿的神经反应尤其受到 母亲的抑郁症状和不安全感对照顾行为和婴儿适应构成风险。 此外，大多数研究都集中在母亲驱动的影响上，限制了对 婴儿特征对母体大脑的意义。此外，对母体大脑的研究 主要由欧洲血统的女性样本组成，因此，人们对这种过程是否存在知之甚少 在不同的颜色家族中也有类似的运作方式。因此，此R01应用程序试图以编程方式研究 母亲的心理风险是否会损害母亲的敏感度，进而影响婴儿的适应能力 在过渡到母亲的过程中影响母亲大脑对婴儿反应的变化。此外，我们还将测试 婴儿特征(即消极情绪性)在调节这一途径中的作用。重要的是，我们包括 欧洲裔美国人(n=200)和非裔美国人(n=200)怀孕未分娩的妇女探索节制 我们的研究结果按母系种族分类。我们进一步建议识别人(父母/情感信念)， 与非裔美国妇女有关的社区(亲属/社会支持)和结构性(歧视)因素 这可能会影响她们对母亲身份的神经适应--将这些发现与欧洲血统的女性进行比较。 我们将检查母亲的危险因素(抑郁症状、依恋不安全感)，多层面的相关因素 对于非裔美国女性，以及大脑对婴儿暗示的反应，产前(3个月)和产后(4个月和 8个月)。出生后评估将包括照顾行为(4、8和12个月)，婴儿负面 情绪性(4个月和8个月)和婴儿适应(12个月)，包括依恋安全和行为 有问题。我们的方法是创新的，考虑到它的跨代性、前瞻性、多层次和多时间点 被录取的母亲样本中的设计和种族多样性。我们的发现将使模型了解这一变化 母亲从怀孕到产后的大脑以及母亲的抑郁和依恋不安全感 可能会对母亲的照料和婴儿的适应造成风险，因为婴儿的负面情绪和 母性种族。此外，我们的方法将允许为妇女制定更有针对性的干预战略。 在他们过渡到母亲的过程中，以优化母亲和儿童的福祉。

Abstract One of the major contributions of developmental psychology is the demonstration that early caregiving experiences within the normative range (i.e., sensitive caregiving) not only contribute to offspring’s mental and physical health disparities, but also that such associations are enduring over the life course. Research by the PIs and others has identified brain mechanisms by which key maternal risk factors—depressive symptoms and attachment insecurity—undermine caregiving behavior. However, given evidence documenting significant change in the maternal brain over the transition to motherhood, there is a critical gap as to whether this transition serves as a sensitive period during which maternal neural responding to infants is particularly impacted by maternal depressive symptoms and insecurity that pose risk for caregiving behavior and infant adjustment. Moreover, the majority of research has focused exclusively on mother-driven effects, limiting understanding of the significance of infant characteristics for the maternal brain. Additionally, research on the maternal brain primarily comprises samples of European ancestry women, thus, little is known about whether such processes operate similarly in families of color. Therefore, this R01 application seeks to programmatically investigate whether maternal psychological risk undermines maternal sensitivity and, in turn, infant adjustment via negatively impacting change in maternal brain responding to infants over the transition to motherhood. Further, we will test the role of infant characteristics (i.e., negative emotionality) in moderating this pathway. Critically, we include expectant nulliparous European American (n=200) and African American (n=200) women to explore moderation of our findings by maternal ethnicity. We further propose to identify person (parenting/emotion beliefs), community (kinship/social support), and structural (discrimination) factors relevant to African American women that may impact their neural adaptation to motherhood – comparing these findings to European Ancestry women. We will examine maternal risk factors (depressive symptoms, attachment insecurity), multi-level factors relevant to African American women, and brain responding to infant cues prenatally (3rd trimester) and postnatally (4 and 8 months). Postnatal assessments will include caregiving behavior (4, 8, and 12 months), infant negative emotionality (4 and 8 months), and infant adjustment (12 months), including attachment security and behavior problems. Our approach is innovative given its intergenerational, prospective, multi-level, and multi-time point design and the ethnic diversity in the maternal sample enrolled. Our findings will inform models of the changing maternal brain from pregnancy to the postpartum period and how maternal depression and attachment insecurity may pose risk for maternal caregiving and infant adjustment as a function of infant negative emotionality and maternal ethnicity. Furthermore, our approach will allow for more targeted intervention strategies for women during their transition to motherhood to optimize mother and child well-being.