Maternal depression and antidepressants epigenetically change infant language development

This 2012 human study found that infant language development accelerated when the depressed mother-to-be took antidepressants:

“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.”

Infant language development was delayed when the depressed mother-to-be didn’t take serotonin reuptake inhibitor medication:

“Prenatal depressed maternal mood and (S)SRI exposure were found to shift developmental milestones bidirectionally on infant speech perception tasks.”

Contrast this study with Problematic research with telomere length, which pretended that maternal depression had negligible epigenetic effects on the developing fetus, infant, and child. “Prenatal exposure to antidepressants and depressed maternal mood alter trajectory of infant speech perception”

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