Do pregnancy and delivery complications differentially affect infant development in children of schizophrenic parents compared to children of normal or nonschizophrenic psychiatric parents?
Children of schizophrenic parents, particularly when the father is affected, may be at higher risk for low birth weight and developmental abnormalities related to pregnancy complications.
Abstract A twenty‐year study was begun in Denmark in 1962 of the differential effects of pregnancy and delivery complications on children of schizophrenic parents, on children of normal parents, and on children of parents with nonschizophrenic psychiatric disorders. This paper studies these children and their parents in 1971 utilizing data on pregnancy, delivery, and the physical and neurological examinations of the children at birth and at one year of age. Results include (1) a higher incidence of mildly low birth weight in children born to schizophrenics, also associated with developmental abnormalities at one year, (2) a higher incidence of infant females suffering from the effects of pregnancy complications, particularly where the schizophrenic parent was the father, and (3) a large number of results which involve the schizophrenic fathers.
Mednick et al. (Wed,) studied this question.