Women’s Mental Health
A growing body of scientific evidence indicates that when pregnant people experience stress, anxiety, and depression, it affects them as well as their offspring in utero. The Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology conducts research which contributes to a growing body of scientific evidence establishing a ‘third pathway’ for the familial inheritance of risk for psychiatric illness beyond shared genes and the quality of parental care: the impact of pregnant people’s distress on fetal and infant brain-behavior development.
The PerinatalPathways Lab at Columbia conducts research studies with pregnant people and their babies to support their wellbeing and their future children’s lives. Ongoing projects include studies on fetal assessment, newborn neuro-imaging, genetics, epigenetics, psychoneuroimmunology, mother–child interaction, and supportive interventions to (1) characterize maternal experiences and the effects on children’s development and (2) promote maternal psychobiological health for the mother–child dyad.
Faculty Active in this Area