Perinatal Risk Factors and Associations with Childhood Cognition: Evidence from Growing Up in New Zealand

Abstract

Background: The critical role perinatal characteristics play in offspring health and well-being is well established within the field of developmental psychology. Most research has tended to focus on how these factors influence children’s biological health and psycho-social development in middle childhood to adolescence. The role in which the intrauterine environment has on the developing brain and the implications these have on individual cognitive domains in childhood is less understood, and yet this is perhaps the most fundamental period of brain development. Moreover, the extent to which the cumulative toll these perinatal factors may have on childhood cognition is under researched. The ways in which perinatal features may contribute to early childhood cognitive development thus requires further investigation. Aim: The aim of this research was to examine the association between maternal perinatal characteristics and their children’s early cognitive development across three critical areas of cognition: motor control, inhibitory control and receptive language. Methods: This study analysed data from 5762 children and their parents involved in the Growing Up in New Zealand longitudinal study. Information about the mothers’ socio-demographic profile, perinatal physical and mental health characteristics were collected during pregnancy and in interviews after the birth. Childrens’ inhibitory control, motor skills and receptive language were measured at age 4.5 years. Covariates included maternal age, education and ethnicity, socio-economic status, rurality, whether the pregnancy was planned, and the child’s age and gender. Results: Binary multivariate logistic regression analyses showed that delays in cognitive domains were positively associated with multiple negative maternal perinatal characteristics (i.e. alcohol intake, smoking, no folate intake, depression, low birth weight), and negatively associated with folate intake during the first trimester, and being a first-born child. There was also a cumulative effect on childhood cognition, whereby children exposed to greater levels of deleterious perinatal characteristics were more likely to have delays in inhibitory control, motor ability and receptive language skills. Conclusion: Perinatal maternal and child characteristics have a significant impact both individually and cumulatively on a child’s development during the first four years of life. Moreover, these effects are not limited to one domain; rather, they appear to influence a wide range of cognitive abilities.