Heritability of childhood/adolescent depression. Cross-fostering experiment, IVF.

Genetics of childhood and adolescent depression: insights into etiological heterogeneity and challenges for future genomic research

Rice and colleagues have used a "prenatal cross-fostering' design where pregnant mothers are related or unrelated to their child as a result of in vitro fertilization (IVF) was used to disentangle maternally inherited and environmental influences."

They have noted "Associations between prenatal stress and offspring birth weight, gestational age and antisocial behaviour were seen in both related and unrelated mother-offspring pairs, consistent with there being environmental links. The association between prenatal stress and offspring anxiety in related and unrelated groups appeared to be due to current maternal anxiety/depression rather than prenatal stress. In contrast, the link between prenatal stress and offspring attention deficit hyperactivity disorder was only present in related mother-offspring pairs and therefore was attributable to inherited factors."


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19476689

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