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Adverse family life events during pregnancy and ADHD symptoms in five‐year‐old offspring
Author(s) -
Rosenqvist Mina A.,
Sjölander Arvid,
Ystrom Eivind,
Larsson Henrik,
ReichbornKjennerud Ted
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
journal of child psychology and psychiatry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.652
H-Index - 211
eISSN - 1469-7610
pISSN - 0021-9630
DOI - 10.1111/jcpp.12990
Subject(s) - offspring , sibling , pregnancy , confounding , psychology , cohort , population , cohort study , adverse effect , attention deficit hyperactivity disorder , norwegian , logistic regression , demography , psychiatry , pediatrics , medicine , developmental psychology , linguistics , philosophy , genetics , sociology , biology
Background Prenatal exposure to maternal adverse life events has been associated with offspring ADHD , but the role of familial confounding is unclear. We aimed to clarify if adverse life events during pregnancy are related to ADHD symptoms in offspring, taking shared familial factors into account. Method Data were collected on 34,751 children (including 6,427 siblings) participating in the population‐based Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study. During pregnancy, mothers reported whether they had experienced specific life events. We assessed ADHD symptoms in five‐year‐old children with the Conners’ Parent Rating Scale–Revised: short form. We modeled the associations between life events and mean ADHD scores with ordinary linear regression in the full cohort, and with fixed‐effect linear regression in sibling comparisons to adjust for familial confounding. Results Children exposed to adverse life events had higher ADHD scores at age 5, with the strongest effect observed for financial problems (mean differences 0.10 [95% CI : 0.09, 0.11] in adjusted model), and the weakest for having lost someone close (0.02 [95% CI 0.01, 0.04] in adjusted model). Comparing exposure‐discordant siblings resulted in attenuated estimates that were no longer statistically significant (e.g. mean difference for financial problems −0.03 [95% CI −0.07, 0.02]). ADHD scores increased if the mother had experienced the event as painful or difficult, and with the number of events, whereas sibling‐comparison analyses resulted in estimates attenuated toward the null. Conclusions These results suggest that the association between adverse life events during pregnancy and offspring ADHD symptoms is largely explained by familial factors.