Several aspects of the proposal, which aims to expand open access, require serious discussion and, in some cases, a rethink.
Image credit: Dave Cutler (artist).
New Research In
Physical Sciences
Featured Portals
Articles by Topic
Biological Sciences
Featured Portals
Articles by Topic
Edited by Gene E. Robinson, University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, Urbana, IL, and approved May 31, 2012 (received for review February 14, 2012)
Abstract
Language acquisition reflects a complex interplay between biology and early experience. Psychotropic medication exposure has been shown to alter neural plasticity and shift sensitive periods in perceptual development. Notably, serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SRIs) are antidepressant agents increasingly prescribed to manage antenatal mood disorders, and depressed maternal mood per se during pregnancy impacts infant behavior, also raising concerns about long-term consequences following such developmental exposure. We studied whether infants’ language development is altered by prenatal exposure to SRIs and whether such effects differ from exposure to maternal mood disturbances. Infants from non–SRI-treated mothers with little or no depression (control), depressed but non–SRI-treated (depressed-only), and depressed and treated with an SRI (SRI-exposed) were studied at 36 wk gestation (while still in utero) on a consonant and vowel discrimination task and at 6 and 10 mo of age on a nonnative speech and visual language discrimination task. Whereas the control infants responded as expected (success at 6 mo and failure at 10 mo) the SRI-exposed infants failed to discriminate the language differences at either age and the depressed-only infants succeeded at 10 mo instead of 6 mo. Fetuses at 36 wk gestation in the control condition performed as expected, with a response on vowel but not consonant discrimination, whereas the SRI-exposed fetuses showed accelerated perceptual development by discriminating both vowels and consonants. Thus, prenatal depressed maternal mood and SRI exposure were found to shift developmental milestones bidirectionally on infant speech perception tasks.
Footnotes
- ↵1To whom correspondence may be addressed. E-mail: toberlander{at}cw.bc.ca or jwerker{at}psych.ubc.ca.
Author contributions: W.M.W., T.F.O., T.K.H., and J.F.W. designed research; W.M.W. performed research; W.M.W. and T.F.O. analyzed data; and W.M.W., T.F.O., T.K.H., and J.F.W. wrote the paper.
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
This article is a PNAS Direct Submission.
This paper results from the Arthur M. Sackler Colloquium of the National Academy of Sciences, “Biological Embedding of Early Social Adversity: From Fruit Flies to Kindergartners,” held December 9–10, 2011, at the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Center of the National Academies of Sciences and Engineering in Irvine, CA. The complete program and audio files of most presentations are available on the NAS Web site at www.nasonline.org/biological-embedding.
Prenatal exposure alters speech perception
Sign up for Article Alerts
Jump to section
You May Also be Interested in
Several large or long-lived animals seem strangely resistant to developing cancer. Elucidating the reasons why could lead to promising cancer-fighting strategies in humans.
Image credit: Shutterstock.com/ronnybas frimages.
PNAS Profile of NAS member and biochemist Hao Wu
A study suggests a putative gene-expression hallmark common to monogamous male vertebrates of some species, namely cichlid fishes, dendrobatid frogs, passeroid songbirds, common voles, and deer mice, and identifies 24 candidate genes potentially associated with monogamy.
Image courtesy of Yusan Yang (University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh).
Physical and social well-being in old age are linked to self-assessments of life worth, and a spectrum of behavioral, economic, health, and social variables may influence whether aging individuals believe they are leading meaningful lives.
Image courtesy of Pixabay/MabelAmber.