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Mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in infancy: an MRI study

It is generally agreed that the human brain is responsive to environmental influences, and that the male brain may be particularly sensitive to early adversity. However, this is largely based on retrospective studies of older children and adolescents exposed to extreme environments in childhood. Les...

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Autores principales: Sethna, Vaheshta, Pote, Inês, Wang, Siying, Gudbrandsen, Maria, Blasi, Anna, McCusker, Caroline, Daly, Eileen, Perry, Emily, Adams, Kerrie P. H., Kuklisova-Murgasova, Maria, Busuulwa, Paula, Lloyd-Fox, Sarah, Murray, Lynne, Johnson, Mark H., Williams, Steven C. R., Murphy, Declan G. M., Craig, Michael C., McAlonan, Grainne M.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2016
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5504257/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27915378
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00429-016-1347-1
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author Sethna, Vaheshta
Pote, Inês
Wang, Siying
Gudbrandsen, Maria
Blasi, Anna
McCusker, Caroline
Daly, Eileen
Perry, Emily
Adams, Kerrie P. H.
Kuklisova-Murgasova, Maria
Busuulwa, Paula
Lloyd-Fox, Sarah
Murray, Lynne
Johnson, Mark H.
Williams, Steven C. R.
Murphy, Declan G. M.
Craig, Michael C.
McAlonan, Grainne M.
author_facet Sethna, Vaheshta
Pote, Inês
Wang, Siying
Gudbrandsen, Maria
Blasi, Anna
McCusker, Caroline
Daly, Eileen
Perry, Emily
Adams, Kerrie P. H.
Kuklisova-Murgasova, Maria
Busuulwa, Paula
Lloyd-Fox, Sarah
Murray, Lynne
Johnson, Mark H.
Williams, Steven C. R.
Murphy, Declan G. M.
Craig, Michael C.
McAlonan, Grainne M.
author_sort Sethna, Vaheshta
collection PubMed
description It is generally agreed that the human brain is responsive to environmental influences, and that the male brain may be particularly sensitive to early adversity. However, this is largely based on retrospective studies of older children and adolescents exposed to extreme environments in childhood. Less is understood about how normative variations in parent–child interactions are associated with the development of the infant brain in typical settings. To address this, we used magnetic resonance imaging to investigate the relationship between observational measures of mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in a community sample of 3- to 6-month-old infants (N = 39). In addition, we examined whether this relationship differed in male and female infants. We found that lower maternal sensitivity was correlated with smaller subcortical grey matter volumes in the whole sample, and that this was similar in both sexes. However, male infants who showed greater levels of positive communication and engagement during early interactions had smaller cerebellar volumes. These preliminary findings suggest that variations in mother–infant interaction dimensions are associated with differences in infant brain development. Although the study is cross-sectional and causation cannot be inferred, the findings reveal a dynamic interaction between brain and environment that may be important when considering interventions to optimize infant outcomes.
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spelling pubmed-55042572017-07-25 Mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in infancy: an MRI study Sethna, Vaheshta Pote, Inês Wang, Siying Gudbrandsen, Maria Blasi, Anna McCusker, Caroline Daly, Eileen Perry, Emily Adams, Kerrie P. H. Kuklisova-Murgasova, Maria Busuulwa, Paula Lloyd-Fox, Sarah Murray, Lynne Johnson, Mark H. Williams, Steven C. R. Murphy, Declan G. M. Craig, Michael C. McAlonan, Grainne M. Brain Struct Funct Original Article It is generally agreed that the human brain is responsive to environmental influences, and that the male brain may be particularly sensitive to early adversity. However, this is largely based on retrospective studies of older children and adolescents exposed to extreme environments in childhood. Less is understood about how normative variations in parent–child interactions are associated with the development of the infant brain in typical settings. To address this, we used magnetic resonance imaging to investigate the relationship between observational measures of mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in a community sample of 3- to 6-month-old infants (N = 39). In addition, we examined whether this relationship differed in male and female infants. We found that lower maternal sensitivity was correlated with smaller subcortical grey matter volumes in the whole sample, and that this was similar in both sexes. However, male infants who showed greater levels of positive communication and engagement during early interactions had smaller cerebellar volumes. These preliminary findings suggest that variations in mother–infant interaction dimensions are associated with differences in infant brain development. Although the study is cross-sectional and causation cannot be inferred, the findings reveal a dynamic interaction between brain and environment that may be important when considering interventions to optimize infant outcomes. Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2016-12-03 2017 /pmc/articles/PMC5504257/ /pubmed/27915378 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00429-016-1347-1 Text en © The Author(s) 2016 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
spellingShingle Original Article
Sethna, Vaheshta
Pote, Inês
Wang, Siying
Gudbrandsen, Maria
Blasi, Anna
McCusker, Caroline
Daly, Eileen
Perry, Emily
Adams, Kerrie P. H.
Kuklisova-Murgasova, Maria
Busuulwa, Paula
Lloyd-Fox, Sarah
Murray, Lynne
Johnson, Mark H.
Williams, Steven C. R.
Murphy, Declan G. M.
Craig, Michael C.
McAlonan, Grainne M.
Mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in infancy: an MRI study
title Mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in infancy: an MRI study
title_full Mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in infancy: an MRI study
title_fullStr Mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in infancy: an MRI study
title_full_unstemmed Mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in infancy: an MRI study
title_short Mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in infancy: an MRI study
title_sort mother–infant interactions and regional brain volumes in infancy: an mri study
topic Original Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5504257/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27915378
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00429-016-1347-1
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