{"id":2092,"date":"2019-05-13T13:51:45","date_gmt":"2019-05-13T03:51:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/cannabis-use-during-pregnancy-may-affect-brain-development-in-offspring-2\/"},"modified":"2025-11-12T21:00:34","modified_gmt":"2025-11-12T10:00:34","slug":"cannabis-use-during-pregnancy-may-affect-brain-development-in-offspring-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/cannabis-use-during-pregnancy-may-affect-brain-development-in-offspring-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Cannabis Use During Pregnancy May Affect Brain Development in Offspring"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em style=\"background-color: inherit; color: inherit; font-family: inherit; font-size: 1rem;\">Reports new study in Biological Psychiatry<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Cannabis use during pregnancy is associated with abnormal brain structure in children, according to a new&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0006322315006927\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">study<\/a>&nbsp;in&nbsp;<em>Biological Psychiatry<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Compared with unexposed children, those who were prenatally exposed to cannabis had a thicker prefrontal cortex, a region of the brain involved in complex cognition, decision-making, and working memory.<\/p>\n<p>Author of the study Dr. Hanan El Marroun, of Erasmus University Medical Center in The Netherlands, said: \u201cthis study is important because cannabis use during pregnancy is relatively common and we know very little about the potential consequences of cannabis exposure during pregnancy and brain development later in life.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>An estimated 2\u201313% of women worldwide use cannabis during pregnancy. Previous studies have identified short and long-term behavioral consequences of prenatal cannabis exposure, but effects on brain morphology were unknown.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUnderstanding what happens in the brain may give us insights in how children develop after being exposed to cannabis,\u201d said El Marroun.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have to be careful interpreting the results of the current study,\u201d said El Marroun, noting that further research is necessary to explore the causal nature of the relationship between prenatal cannabis exposure and structural brain abnormalities.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNevertheless, the current study combined with existing literature does support the importance of preventing smoking cannabis and cigarettes during pregnancy,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"button\" href=\"https:\/\/www.elsevier.com\/about\/press-releases\/research-and-journals\/cannabis-use-during-pregnancy-may-affect-brain-development-in-offspring\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">For More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reports new study in Biological Psychiatry Cannabis use during pregnancy is associated with abnormal brain structure in children, according to a new&nbsp;study&nbsp;in&nbsp;Biological Psychiatry. Compared with unexposed children, those who were prenatally exposed to cannabis had a thicker prefrontal cortex, a region of the brain involved in complex cognition, decision-making, and working memory. Author of the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":"","_wp_rev_ctl_limit":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[77],"class_list":["post-2092","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cannabis-as-medicine","tag-cannabis-as-medicine"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2092","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2092"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2092\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dalgarnoinstitute.org.au\/wp_site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}