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Synopsis:From studies in animal models we know that early environmental factors and especially maternal factors can influence the development of behavioral and hypothalamic pituitary adrenal (HPA) axis regulation. However, in humans, many questions remain about the relations between the early environment and the young infant’s HPA axis. Similarly, there is evidence from animal studies that early life factors also have an impact on the immune system. Effects of the early environment, and more specifically of maternal and caregiving factors, on human infants’ health have been less well studied. Studying the links between early environmental factors and infants’ HPA axis, behavioral regulation, and health is important because in the case of negative effects, infants’ future psychological and physical development could be compromised.
In this talk I will present results from a relatively large, prospective longitudinal study on the effects of early life factors on infant regulation and health throughout the first year of life. The Bibo study is an ongoing study with 193 infants followed from the end of pregnancy. In this presentation results of three lines of research within our study will be described: 1) maternal stress during pregnancy in relation to infant health throughout the first year of life; 2) maternal caregiving choices (i.e. feeding and sleeping arrangements) in relation to infant cortisol stress reactions; and 3) infant intestinal microbiota, as a source of internal stress, in relation to the development of colic, or excessive crying. These results provide empirical support for possible programming effects of the early fetal and caregiving environments on the infant’s crying behavior, cortisol reactivity and health. Whether these effects are long-lasting and (mal)adaptive remains to be determined.
Speaker:A/ Professor Carolina de Weerth is associate professor in the department of Developmental Psychology of the Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands. She is a developmental psychobiologist, and her research takes place within the Behavioural Science Institute. In 2005, with the aid of a personal grant (Vidi-NWO), she started a prospective, longitudinal project on the development of cortisol regulation and behavioral/emotional self-regulation during an infant’s first year of life (BIBO project).