Objective

To investigate the relation between parental age, and behavioral, cognitive and brain differences in the children.

Method

Data with children aged 9–11 of 8709 mothers with parental age 15–45 years were analyzed from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study. A general linear model was used to test the associations of the parental age with brain structure, and behavioral and cognitive problems scores.

Results

Behavioral and cognitive problems were greater in the children of the younger mothers, and were associated with lower volumes of cortical regions in the children. There was a linear correlation between the behavioral and cognitive problems scores, and the lower brain volumes (r > 0.6), which was evident when parental age was included as a stratification factor. The regions with lower volume included the anterior cingulate cortex, medial and lateral orbitofrontal cortex and amygdala, parahippocampal gyrus and hippocampus, and temporal lobe (FDR corrected p < 0.01). The lower cortical volumes and areas in the children significantly mediated the association between the parental age and the behavioral and cognitive problems in the children (all p < 10⁻⁴). The effects were large, such as the 71.4% higher depressive problems score, and 27.5% higher rule-breaking score, in the children of mothers aged 15–19 than the mothers aged 34–35.

Conclusions

Lower parental age is associated with behavioral problems and reduced cognitive performance in the children, and these differences are related to lower volumes and areas of some cortical regions which mediate the effects in the children. The findings are relevant to psychiatric understanding and assessment.

中文翻译：

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父母年龄、大脑结构与儿童行为和认知问题之间的关联

客观的

调查父母年龄与儿童行为、认知和大脑差异之间的关系。

方法

从青少年大脑认知发展 (ABCD) 研究中分析了 8709 名父母年龄为 15-45 岁的母亲中 9-11 岁儿童的数据。使用一般线性模型来测试父母年龄与大脑结构、行为和认知问题评分之间的关​​联。

结果

年轻母亲的孩子的行为和认知问题更大，并且与孩子的皮质区域体积较小有关。行为和认知问题得分与较低的脑容量之间存在线性相关性 ( r  > 0.6)，这在将父母年龄作为分层因素时很明显。体积较小的区域包括前扣带皮层、内侧和外侧眶额叶皮层和杏仁核、海马旁回和海马体以及颞叶（FDR 校正后的p  < 0.01）。儿童较低的皮质体积和区域显着介导了父母年龄与儿童行为和认知问题之间的关联（所有p  < 10^-4）。影响很大，例如 15-19 岁母亲的孩子比 34-35 岁母亲的孩子抑郁问题得分高 71.4%，违规得分高 27.5%。

结论

较低的父母年龄与儿童的行为问题和认知能力下降有关，这些差异与某些皮质区域的体积和面积较小有关，这些皮质区域会调节儿童的影响。这些发现与精神病学的理解和评估有关。