One consideration for thinking about the relation between stress and pregnancy is the matter of stress in pregnancy and autism. As we've emphasized elsewhere, stressing about stress is a counter-productive cycle that needs to be avoided. However, knowledge is valuable.
Expecting mothers - and their partners - need to know that there is increasing evidence that stress can be harmful to their unborn children, including increasing the possibility of autism. Before launching into the science, though, a couple qualifications are valuable.
Currently the evidence comes from mice studies. Research with mice has undoubtedly offered great medical advances and provided value insights into human diseases. It does not though thereby logically follow that any finding based on mice studies can be automatically and immediately applied to humans. Whether such application is valid remains to be seen.
Another qualification to keep in mind is the always delicate issue of relevant proportionality. For instance, pumping mice full of some toxin in volumes utterly disproportionate to usual human practices surely does still provide valuable scientific insights. Not among those insights though would be any predictive value for assessing the relevance to the characteristically different human behavior.
So, even when researchers say the mice have been exposed to mild stress, this tells us neither what that stress level was nor how it does (or doesn't) translate to human experience. We shouldn't fill that opening by jumping to conclusions. Especially not conclusions derived from our worst fears.
Keeping those qualifications close at hand, it is true that experimental research has demonstrated in mice the placenta can transmit biochemical effects of stress to the fetus. The key factor here is an enzyme called OGT. Research suggests the OGT is inhibited in the placenta of mice who are subjected to what researchers describe as mild stress.
It is valuable to observe that this mouse stress was generated through exposure to both unfamiliar noises and to the scent of foxes. This author remains unclear as to why - since we know that scent reaction can be wired into the evolved psychology through natural selection - the stress caused by exposure to threat of a natural predator should be considered mild.
Still, while human applicability is complicated by this methodological wrinkle, there is value in observing that at least some level of stress among mice does correlate to significantly reduced OGT levels. These reductions triggered brain alternations for over 370 of the mice's genes.
These changed neurons are critical to neurological development, including regulation of energy use, protein development and nerve cell connections. It appears likely then that OGT helps protect the brain in pregnancy.
An important difference between male and female fetuses comes into play, here. There is a naturally lower OGT level in male fetuses. Consequently, whatever the level of stress sufficient to trigger reduced OGT, the affect will be felt sooner and more drastically in the development of boys. Such conjecture would be supported by the documented fact of higher autism and schizophrenia occurrence among males.
To repeat, this is valuable knowledge that expecting mothers and their partners should understand. As with all information, though, the correct response is not increased stress! Rather it is yet further reason to be proactive in reducing pregnancy stress. See our suggestions for solutions that work .
Expecting mothers - and their partners - need to know that there is increasing evidence that stress can be harmful to their unborn children, including increasing the possibility of autism. Before launching into the science, though, a couple qualifications are valuable.
Currently the evidence comes from mice studies. Research with mice has undoubtedly offered great medical advances and provided value insights into human diseases. It does not though thereby logically follow that any finding based on mice studies can be automatically and immediately applied to humans. Whether such application is valid remains to be seen.
Another qualification to keep in mind is the always delicate issue of relevant proportionality. For instance, pumping mice full of some toxin in volumes utterly disproportionate to usual human practices surely does still provide valuable scientific insights. Not among those insights though would be any predictive value for assessing the relevance to the characteristically different human behavior.
So, even when researchers say the mice have been exposed to mild stress, this tells us neither what that stress level was nor how it does (or doesn't) translate to human experience. We shouldn't fill that opening by jumping to conclusions. Especially not conclusions derived from our worst fears.
Keeping those qualifications close at hand, it is true that experimental research has demonstrated in mice the placenta can transmit biochemical effects of stress to the fetus. The key factor here is an enzyme called OGT. Research suggests the OGT is inhibited in the placenta of mice who are subjected to what researchers describe as mild stress.
It is valuable to observe that this mouse stress was generated through exposure to both unfamiliar noises and to the scent of foxes. This author remains unclear as to why - since we know that scent reaction can be wired into the evolved psychology through natural selection - the stress caused by exposure to threat of a natural predator should be considered mild.
Still, while human applicability is complicated by this methodological wrinkle, there is value in observing that at least some level of stress among mice does correlate to significantly reduced OGT levels. These reductions triggered brain alternations for over 370 of the mice's genes.
These changed neurons are critical to neurological development, including regulation of energy use, protein development and nerve cell connections. It appears likely then that OGT helps protect the brain in pregnancy.
An important difference between male and female fetuses comes into play, here. There is a naturally lower OGT level in male fetuses. Consequently, whatever the level of stress sufficient to trigger reduced OGT, the affect will be felt sooner and more drastically in the development of boys. Such conjecture would be supported by the documented fact of higher autism and schizophrenia occurrence among males.
To repeat, this is valuable knowledge that expecting mothers and their partners should understand. As with all information, though, the correct response is not increased stress! Rather it is yet further reason to be proactive in reducing pregnancy stress. See our suggestions for solutions that work .
About the Author:
Expecting moms and their birth supporters who want to keep up on all the relevant news need to follow the Stress and Pregnancy site. Also, for more great information about healthy life-choice, check out the info at our sister project, the Getting Rid of a Headache Without Medicine blog.
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