Stress in pregnancy can impact future generations

Children whose grandmothers were stressed during pregnancy have an increased chance of mental health problems.

October 2015

A study by Paula Brunton and Natalia Grundwald shows that the effects of maternal stress during pregnancy can be transmitted to both the first and second generation of rat offspring.

They found that increased anxiety is linked to changes in genes expressed in the part of the brain that regulates emotions such as fear and anxiety.

Previous research suggests that stress during pregnancy is harmful to developing babies' brains and is linked to a greater risk of mental health disorders. However, until now it was not known that the harmful effects of prenatal stress could present themselves in future generations.

In their paper published in the journal Psychoneuroendocrinology, they show that the second generation of offspring from rats who had experienced social stress during pregnancy - caused by short periods of exposure to unfamiliar female rats - were more anxious than those whose grandmothers had not experienced stress.

These offspring showed a pattern of gene expression in a region of the brain - known as the amygdala - that is associated with an increased risk of anxiety disorders.

The findings provide researchers with greater insight into the origins of mood disorders. Understanding the mechanisms that allow the effects of stress to be transmitted to future generations could help researchers find new ways of treating some mental health conditions.

It appears from this work that  stress during pregnancy has long term health implications not only for  the unborn child but also for future generations.

The full details of the study can be found here:

Prenatal stress programs neuroendocrine stress responses and affective behaviors in second generation rats in a sex-dependent manner

This research was supported by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council.

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