High levels of stress hormone during pregnancy tied to early language development in offsprings

“To our knowledge, this is the first study to investigate the association between maternal cortisol levels and language development in children over time, also taking offspring sex and maternal educational level into account,” said Dr Anja Fenger Dreyer, who was involved in the study.

She added: “We have had access to a large study cohort, high-quality methods of analysis and relevant covariates, making our study an important contribution to the physiological understanding of prenatal cortisol exposure in fetal maturation and child development.”

The team will next assess whether children exposed to high cortisol in the womb are more likely to have higher intelligence quotient (IQ) scores. Except for the data on maternal cortisol levels and early language development, the Odense Child Cohort also has data on intelligence tests carried out by children aged 7. “Early language development in children is known as a predictor for a cognitive function later in life, such as attention, memory and learning, so we want to investigate whether prenatal cortisol exposure is also associated with IQ scores of children aged seven years old,” said Dr Fenger Dreyer.

Reference:

Stress hormone during pregnancy may improve early language development in children, European Society of Endocrinology, Meeting, European Congress of Endocrinology 2023.