The investigation revealed that having a rigorous upbringing might have an effect on how the body interprets DNA.
The method in which the body interprets the DNA of the children may change as a consequence of the tight parenting style. These modifications may become “hard-wired” into the DNA of children who perceive their parents to be harsh, which raises the children’s biological risk for clinical depression throughout adolescence and later in life.
Dr. Evelien Van Assche recently gave a presentation on the findings of the study at the Congress of the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) in Vienna.
She elaborates on her research by saying, “We discovered that perceived harsh parenting, with physical punishment and psychological manipulation, can introduce an additional set of instructions on how a gene is read to become hard-wired into DNA. We have some indications that these changes themselves can predispose the growing child to depression. This does not happen to the same extent if the children have had a supportive upbringing.”
Researchers from the University of Leuven in Belgium chose 21 teens who said their parents were good (for example, caring parents who let their kids make their own decisions) and compared them to 23 teens who said their parents were harsh (for example, manipulative behavior, physical punishment, excessive strictness). All of the teens were between 12 and 16 years old, and the average age of both groups was 14. Both groups had 11 teenagers who were boys, so they were the same age and had the same number of boys and girls. Many of the people who had been raised in harsh homes showed early, not-quite-depressive signs.
The researchers then looked at the range of methylation at more than 450,000 places in each subject’s DNA. They found that the range of methylation was much higher in people who had a hard childhood. Methylation is a natural process that happens when a small chemical molecule is added to the DNA. This changes how the instructions written in your DNA are read. For example, methylation can change how much of an enzyme a gene makes by increasing or decreasing the amount of methylation. Depression has been linked to having more methylation variation.
According to Evelien Van Assche, “We based our approach on prior research with identical twins. Two independent groups found that the twin diagnosed with major depression also had a higher range of DNA methylation for the majority of these hundreds of thousands of data points, as compared to the healthy twin.”
Dr. Van Assche, who is currently employed at the University of Munster in Germany, elaborated further by saying, “The DNA stays the same; nevertheless, these extra chemical groups influence how the instructions from the DNA are interpreted.” Those who reported receiving more severe parenting had a predisposition for depression, and we think that this predisposition may be hardwired into their DNA due to a larger level of methylation variation.
We are currently investigating the possibility of closing the loop by linking it to a later diagnosis of depression. Additionally, we are considering the possibility of using this increased methylation variation as a marker in order to provide an early warning to those individuals who may be at a greater risk of developing depression as a result of their upbringing.
She goes on to say, “In this study, we investigated the role of harsh parenting, but it’s likely that any significant stress will lead to such changes in DNA methylation; so in general, stresses in childhood may lead to a general tendency to depression in later life by altering the way your DNA is read. However, these results need to be confirmed in a larger sample.”
“This is a highly essential study to understand the processes of how unpleasant events throughout infancy have life-long effects for both mental health and physical health,” said Professor Christiaan Vinkers of the Department of Psychiatry at the Amsterdam University Medical Centre. There is a lot to gain if we can understand who is at risk and why tight parenting might have different outcomes for different children.
