ArticleThe Journal of pediatrics2018
Maternal Lifetime Trauma and Birthweight: Effect Modification by In Utero Cortisol and Child Sex.
Article in The Journal of pediatrics, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 26 citations in OpenAlex.
- A systematic review of hair cortisol during pregnancy: Reference ranges and methodological considerations.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2020Pooled it
- Prenatal maternal distress and fetal heart rate: Examining sex-specific sensitivity.Journal of affective disorders · 2026Article
- A Spatial Analytic Approach to Maternal Health Following Hurricane Florence (2018).Maternal and child health journal · 2026Article
- A prospective study of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), stress, and birth size in a cohort of U.S. Black women.Environmental health : a global access science source · 2026Article
- The impact of maternal vulnerability on stress biomarkers and first-trimester growth: the Rotterdam Periconceptional Cohort (Predict Study).Human reproduction (Oxford, England) · 2024Article
- Trauma and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder as Important Risk Factors for Gestational Metabolic Dysfunction.American journal of perinatology · 2024Review
- Intergenerational transmission of health inequalities: towards a life course approach to socioeconomic inequalities in health - a review.Journal of epidemiology and community health · 2024Review
- Cumulative maternal lifetime stress & child asthma: effect modification by BMI.Stress (Amsterdam, Netherlands) · 2024Article
- Social disadvantage during pregnancy: effects on gestational age and birthweight.Journal of perinatology : official journal of the California Perinatal Association · 2023Article
- Interaction between birth characteristics andFrontiers in oncology · 2023Article
- Maternal stress and hair cortisol among pregnant women following hurricane Florence.American journal of human biology : the official journal of the Human Biology Council · 2023Article
- Associations between combined exposure to environmental hazards and social stressors at the neighborhood level and individual perinatal outcomes in the ECHO-wide cohort.Health & place · 2022Article
- The influence of maternal anxiety and cortisol during pregnancy on childhood anxiety symptoms.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2022Article
- Prenatal lead exposure and childhood lung function: Influence of maternal cortisol and child sex.Environmental research · 2022Article
- Integrative Review of Early Life Adversity and Cortisol Regulation in Pregnancy.Journal of obstetric, gynecologic, and neonatal nursing : JOGNN · 2021Review
- Associations Between Hormonal Biomarkers and Preterm Infant Health and Development During the First 2 Years After Birth.Biological research for nursing · 2021Article
- Associations Between Maternal Lifetime Stress and Placental Mitochondrial DNA Mutations in an Urban Multiethnic Cohort.Biological psychiatry · 2021Article
- Prenatal maternal hair cortisol concentrations are related to maternal prenatal emotion dysregulation but not neurodevelopmental or birth outcomes.Developmental psychobiology · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
9 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesTo evaluate associations between maternal lifetime traumatic stress and offspring birthweight and examine modifying effects of third trimester cortisol and fetal sex. STUDY
designAnalyses included 314 mother-infant dyads from an ethnically mixed pregnancy cohort. Maternal lifetime trauma was reported via the Life Stressor Checklist-Revised. Fenton birthweight for gestational age z-scores (BWGA-z) were calculated. A 3-cm scalp-nearest maternal hair segment collected at birth was assayed to reflect cumulative third trimester cortisol secretion. Multivariable regression was used to investigate associations between maternal lifetime trauma and BWGA-z and examine 2- and 3-way interactions with cortisol and fetal sex. Because subjects with low or high cortisol levels could represent susceptible populations, varying coefficient models that relax the linearity assumption on cortisol level were used to assess the modification of maternal lifetime trauma associations with BWGA-z as a function of cortisol.
resultsWomen were primarily minorities (41% Hispanic, 26% black) with ≤12 years education (63%); 63% reported ≥1 traumatic event. Prenatal cortisol modified the association between maternal lifetime trauma and birthweight. Women with higher lifetime trauma and increased cortisol had significantly lower birthweight infants in males; among males exposed to the 90th percentile of cortisol, a 1-unit increase in trauma score was associated with a 0.19-unit decrease in BWGA-z (95% CI, -0.34 to -0.04). Associations among females were nonsignificant, regardless of cortisol level.
conclusionsThese findings underscore the need to consider complex interactions among maternal trauma, disrupted in utero cortisol production, and fetal sex to fully elucidate intergenerational effects of maternal lifetime trauma.
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Registered trials
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