Effects of maternal mood and cultural stressors on the programming infant outcomes and inflammatory processes

As the Mexican population grows in the US, Mexican-Americans face the acculturative pressure of accommodating to the dominant American culture while maintaining their Mexican culture. This process of acculturative stress is associated with increased symptoms of depression and anxiety. Mood disorders are particularly prevalent among Mexican-American women in the perinatal period, which in turn can affect birth and neonatal outcomes. Thus, acculturative stress may pose an additional risk for adverse Mexican-American perinatal outcomes. In the current study it was hypothesized that elevated depression, anxiety, stress, a higher degree of acculturative values, and acculturative stress would be associated with adverse infant outcomes.  In an ongoing study, eighteen women of Mexican descent were followed throughout pregnancy and completed questionnaires on acculturative stress, self-reports of anxiety, stress, and depressive symptoms. Information was gathered on infant birth weight, gestational age and number of perinatal outcomes including jaundice, nuchal cord, seizures, respiratory distress syndrome.  As well as a salivary marker infant inflammation, C-reactive protein (CRP), was also collected on a subset of infants at birth. Preliminary analysis identified that participants with more Anglo cultural values had higher anxiety during their early pregnancy (r=0.48, p=.04) and gave birth to neonates with lower birth weight (r=0.48, p=.047). In addition, infants of women who reported more anxiety symptoms (r=0.75, p=0.02) and self-reported infection symptoms (r=0.88, p=0.004) during late pregnancy exhibited increased inflammatory levels of CRP. These findings suggest altered inflammatory profiles in neonates may be programmed during pregnancy in the Mexican-American mother/child dyad.