TY - JOUR
T1 - The Effects of Prenatal Exposure to Neighborhood Crime on Neonatal Functional Connectivity
AU - Brady, Rebecca G.
AU - Rogers, Cynthia
AU - Prochaska, Trinidi
AU - Kaplan, Sydney
AU - Lean, Rachel E.
AU - Smyser, Tara A.
AU - Shimony, Joshua S.
AU - Slavich, George M.
AU - Warner, Barbara B.
AU - Barch, Deanna M.
AU - Luby, Joan L.
AU - Smyser, Christopher D.
N1 - Funding Information:
Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institutes of Health (Grant No. R01 MH113883 [to JLL, CDS, BBW, DMB, CER] and Grant No. F30 HD104313-01A1 [to RGB] ), March of Dimes Prematurity Research Center at Washington University , Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center at Washington University (Grant No. P50 HD103525 ), Washington University in St. Louis Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity, and Equity Small Grant [to RGB, DMB], Children’s Discovery Institute, McDonnell Center for Systems Neuroscience, the Washington University Medical Scientist Training Program [to RGB], and the California Initiative to Advance Precision Medicine (Grant No. OPR21101 [to GMS]).
Funding Information:
Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institutes of Health (Grant No. R01 MH113883 [to JLL, CDS, BBW, DMB, CER] and Grant No. F30 HD104313-01A1 [to RGB]), March of Dimes Prematurity Research Center at Washington University, Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center at Washington University (Grant No. P50 HD103525), Washington University in St. Louis Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity, and Equity Small Grant [to RGB, DMB], Children's Discovery Institute, McDonnell Center for Systems Neuroscience, the Washington University Medical Scientist Training Program [to RGB], and the California Initiative to Advance Precision Medicine (Grant No. OPR21101 [to GMS]). The views are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the funding organizations. We thank the Washington University Neonatal Developmental Research Group, eLABE staff, and the families involved with the study. The authors report no biomedical financial interests or potential conflicts of interest.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Society of Biological Psychiatry
PY - 2022/7/15
Y1 - 2022/7/15
N2 - Background: Maternal exposure to adversity during pregnancy has been found to affect infant brain development; however, the specific effect of prenatal crime exposure on neonatal brain connectivity remains unclear. Based on existing research, we hypothesized that living in a high-crime neighborhood during pregnancy would affect neonatal frontolimbic connectivity over and above other individual- and neighborhood-level adversity and that these associations would be mediated by maternal psychosocial stress. Methods: Participants included 399 pregnant women, recruited as part of the eLABE (Early Life Adversity, Biological Embedding, and Risk for Developmental Precursors of Mental Disorders) study. In the neonatal period, 319 healthy, nonsedated infants were scanned using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (repetition time = 800 ms; echo time = 37 ms; voxel size = 2.0 × 2.0 × 2.0 mm3; multiband = 8) on a Prisma 3T scanner and had at least 10 minutes of high-quality data. Crime data at the block group level were obtained from Applied Geographic Solution. Linear regressions and mediation models tested associations between crime, frontolimbic connectivity, and psychosocial stress. Results: Living in a neighborhood with high property crime during pregnancy was related to weaker neonatal functional connectivity between the thalamus–anterior default mode network (aDMN) (β = −0.15, 95% CI = −0.25 to −0.04, p =.008). Similarly, high neighborhood violent crime was related to weaker functional connectivity between the thalamus-aDMN (β = −0.16, 95% CI = −0.29 to −0.04, p =.01) and amygdala-hippocampus (β = −0.16, 95% CI = −0.29 to −0.03, p =.02), controlling for other types of adversity. Psychosocial stress partially mediated relationships between the thalamus-aDMN and both violent and property crime. Conclusions: These findings suggest that prenatal exposure to crime is associated with weaker neonatal limbic and frontal functional brain connections, providing another reason for targeted public policy interventions to reduce crime.
AB - Background: Maternal exposure to adversity during pregnancy has been found to affect infant brain development; however, the specific effect of prenatal crime exposure on neonatal brain connectivity remains unclear. Based on existing research, we hypothesized that living in a high-crime neighborhood during pregnancy would affect neonatal frontolimbic connectivity over and above other individual- and neighborhood-level adversity and that these associations would be mediated by maternal psychosocial stress. Methods: Participants included 399 pregnant women, recruited as part of the eLABE (Early Life Adversity, Biological Embedding, and Risk for Developmental Precursors of Mental Disorders) study. In the neonatal period, 319 healthy, nonsedated infants were scanned using resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (repetition time = 800 ms; echo time = 37 ms; voxel size = 2.0 × 2.0 × 2.0 mm3; multiband = 8) on a Prisma 3T scanner and had at least 10 minutes of high-quality data. Crime data at the block group level were obtained from Applied Geographic Solution. Linear regressions and mediation models tested associations between crime, frontolimbic connectivity, and psychosocial stress. Results: Living in a neighborhood with high property crime during pregnancy was related to weaker neonatal functional connectivity between the thalamus–anterior default mode network (aDMN) (β = −0.15, 95% CI = −0.25 to −0.04, p =.008). Similarly, high neighborhood violent crime was related to weaker functional connectivity between the thalamus-aDMN (β = −0.16, 95% CI = −0.29 to −0.04, p =.01) and amygdala-hippocampus (β = −0.16, 95% CI = −0.29 to −0.03, p =.02), controlling for other types of adversity. Psychosocial stress partially mediated relationships between the thalamus-aDMN and both violent and property crime. Conclusions: These findings suggest that prenatal exposure to crime is associated with weaker neonatal limbic and frontal functional brain connections, providing another reason for targeted public policy interventions to reduce crime.
KW - Adversity
KW - Functional connectivity
KW - Neighborhood crime
KW - Neonates
KW - Pregnancy
KW - Stress
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85133290117&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.biopsych.2022.01.020
DO - 10.1016/j.biopsych.2022.01.020
M3 - Article
C2 - 35428496
AN - SCOPUS:85133290117
SN - 0006-3223
VL - 92
SP - 139
EP - 148
JO - Biological Psychiatry
JF - Biological Psychiatry
IS - 2
ER -