Cited by 158Birth, Development, and HealthChild Abuse and TraumaStress Responses and Cortisol

Translating basic research knowledge on the biological embedding of early-life stress into novel approaches for the developmental programming of lifelong health

Open access
Heim, Christine M., Entringer, Sonja, Buss, Claudia·2019·Psychoneuroendocrinology

Abstract

This review integrates scientific knowledge obtained over the past few decades on the biological mechanisms that contribute to the profound association between exposure to early adversity, including childhood trauma and prenatal stress, and the lifelong elevated risk to develop a broad range of diseases. We further discuss insights into gene-environment interactions moderating the association between early adversity and disease manifestation and we discuss the role of epigenetic and other molecular processes in the biological embedding of early adversity. Based on these findings, we propose potential mechanisms that may contribute to the intergenerational transmission of risk related to early adversity from the mother to the fetus. Finally, we argue that basic research knowledge on the biological embedding of early adversity must now be translated into novel intervention strategies that are mechanism-driven and sensitive to developmental timing. Indeed, to date, there are no diagnostic biomarkers of risk or mechanism-informed interventions that we can offer to victims of early adversity in order to efficiently prevent or reverse adverse health outcomes. Such translational efforts can be expected to have significant impact on both clinical practice and the public health system, and will promote precision medicine in pediatrics and across the lifespan.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1016/j.psyneuen.2018.12.011

Cites

224 of 224 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • Health conditions associated with early life stress often occur or are aggravated in response to acute stressors in individuals with dysfunctional stress response, which includes changed neurohumoral regulation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis and increased autonomic and inflammatory response.

    “This is probably because health conditions associated with early life stress often occur or are aggravated in response to acute stressors in individuals with dysfunctional stress response, which includes changed neurohumoral regulation of the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis and increased autonomic and inflammatory response [14, 21, 22].”

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

3 of the 227 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.

Research works printed but not linked: 5

  1. Buss C, Entringer S, Wadhwa PD, 2012e Fetal programming of brain development: role of intrauterine stress in susceptibility to psychopathology. Sci. Signal 5 pt7. 23047922 PMC3837231
  2. Entringer S, Buss C, Wadhwa PD, 2011a Prenatal stress and developmental programming of human health and disease risk: concepts and integration of empirical findings. Curr. Opin. Endocrinol. Diabetes Obes 17, 507– 516. PMC3124255 20962631
  3. Entringer S, Buss C, Wadhwa PD, 2012c Prenatal stress, telomere biology, and fetal programming of health and disease risk. Sciene Signaling 5 pt12. 23112344
  4. Hellhammer J, 1990 Burnout Bei Pfelgepersonal - Eine PsychoendokrinologischeUntersuchung. Diploma Thesis. Univerdity of Trier, Germany.
  5. Weiss MJ, Wagner SH, 1998 What explains the negative consequences of adverse childhood experiences on adult health? Insights from cognitive and neuroscience research. Am. J. Prev. Med 14, 356– 360. 9635084

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Heim, C. M., Entringer, S., & Buss, C.
Affiliations
University of California, Irvine (US)
Corresponding author
  • Entringer, Sonja
  • Buss, Claudia
Venue
Psychoneuroendocrinology
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2019-07
Volume
105
Pages
123-137
ISSN
0306-4530 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2905562542
Cited by
158
References
227
Citations by year
2026: 13 · 2025: 21 · 2024: 18 · 2023: 25 · 2022: 35 · 2021: 21 · 2020: 18 · 2019: 7
FWCI
2.20
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Psychoneuroendocrinology (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
  • eScholarship (California Digital Library) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (01KR1301, 01GL1743)
  • Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (EXC257, EN 851/2-1)
  • European Research Council (ERC 639766, ERC 678073)
  • U.S. Public Health Service
  • National Institutes of Health (P50 HD-551411, 5UG3OD023349, R01 HD-065825, R01 AG-050455, R01 MH-105538, R01 HD-060628, MH 58922)
Topics
  • Health Sciences › Medicine › Pediatrics, Perinatology and Child Health › Birth, Development, and Health
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child Abuse and Trauma
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Behavioral Neuroscience › Stress Responses and Cortisol
Keywords
early life stress, biological embedding, developmental programming, childhood trauma, prenatal stress, gene-environment interaction, epigenetics, intergenerational transmission, mother-to-child transmission, precision medicine, developmental timing, disease risk
MeSH terms
Psychological Trauma, Adverse Childhood Experiences, Animals, Brain, Female, Humans, Pregnancy, Prenatal Exposure Delayed Effects, Stress, Psychological, Epigenesis, Genetic, Telomere Shortening, Gene-Environment Interaction

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review