Maternal Depression and Cognitive Features of 9-Year-Old Children Prenatally-Exposed to Cocaine |
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| Authors: | Paul R. Marques Judith L. Pokorni Toby Long Laureen O. Teti |
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| Affiliation: | 1. Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, Calverton, Maryland, USAmarques@pire.org;3. Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, Calverton, Maryland, USA;4. Georgetown University Center for Child and Human Development, Washington, District of Columbia, USA;5. Child Study Center, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA |
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| Abstract: | This study evaluated cocaine exposure and maternal characteristics as competing predictors of school-age cognitive, achievement, and language performance. One group of 47 exposed 9-year-old children were first studied in an earlier prenatal study. A non-exposed contrast group (n = 46) served as a reference. Maternal measures included: IQ, psychopathology, drugs, demographics, and environment. Child intelligence, language, and achievement scores were inversely related to maternal IQ and depression scores, with cocaine exposure significant secondary or tertiary predictors for many children. Verbal IQ scores of exposed children strongly reflected maternal depression (r = .54) but no such relationship was found among the non-exposed cohort (r = .00). |
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| Keywords: | Children cocaine cognitive maternal depression |
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