Biobehavioral factors mediate the association between war-related trauma and psychopathologies in adolescents: A longitudinal study

Abstract

BackgroundEarly-life stress, such as war-related trauma, can have severe and long-lasting effects on children's mental and physical health, along with changes in stress-regulating systems, potentially leading to future psychopathologies. In the current study, we aimed to unravel some biobehavioral factors that mediate the association between trauma exposure and psychopathologies across children's development. MethodThe study followed families exposed to chronic war-related trauma and control groups from infancy to late adolescence. At each time point, maternal and child psychopathology was evaluated, maternal sensitivity was assessed, and the levels of the stress hormone cortisol in the saliva and hair were analyzed at the adolescence time point. ResultsThe results showed that war-exposed children had more internalizing disorders, and their mothers were less sensitive and had more psychopathologies than the control group. Significant differences existed between the exposed and control groups in salivary but not hair cortisol levels. Maternal sensitivity was negatively correlated with mothers' hair and salivary levels of cortisol. In the children, salivary cortisol mediated the negative effects of trauma exposure. The continuity of psychopathology, from early to late adolescence, was mediated by both maternal and child hair cortisol. ConclusionThe results demonstrate the complex interplay of maternal and child’s biobehavioral factors as mediators of risk chronicity across development. Our study highlights the important role that mothers have in the adolescence period and may encourage the use of hormonal and mother‐child interventions for detecting, preventing, diagnosing, and treating early-life stress and trauma exposure.