Mash/Wolfe Abnormal Child Psychology, 4th edition
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2
Theories and Causes
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InfoTrac Student Activity:
“Prenatal Alcohol Exposure: Mood Over Matter?”
(Article #A95765051)
Instructions:
To complete the InfoTrac Activity, login to InfoTrac College Edition using your SSO
account (access to InfoTrac College Edition is included with the purchase of access to
CengageNOW. Visit www.ichapters.com to purchase). Follow the link on the top right
hand side of the companion site to login. Next, search for article listed above. Then, after
reading the article, answer the questions that follow:
Description:
Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) is defined by evidence of growth deficiency, a specific
set of subtle facial anomalies, and evidence of brain damage, occurring in individuals
exposed to alcohol during gestation. Not all children exposed to alcohol during gestation
have full-blown FAS; however, many will display cognitive, adaptive, and behavioral
deficits, as well as problems with emotion regulation. Unfortunately, comparatively little
research has been done in the area of emotional functioning and mental health in children
prenatally exposed to alcohol. A question that commonly arises is whether these
emotional difficulties are a function of neurological damage due to maternal drinking or
whether there are other environmental factors that play a significant role. To help you
consider this often-difficult issue, access an article available on InfoTrac entitled
“Psychiatric illness in a clinical sample of children with prenatal alcohol exposure” by
O’Connor and colleagues (2002). This article focuses on delineating the spectrum of
psychiatric disorders in children with prenatal exposure to alcohol, and suggests that
psychiatric disorders are common within this population.
Questions:
(1) What were the two procedures used to make psychiatric diagnoses?
(2) Did the children with more severe manifestations of prenatal alcohol exposure have
more psychiatric diagnoses than those with less severe manifestations of prenatal alcohol
exposure?
(3) Which psychiatric disorder was most prevalent in the overall sample?
(4) What was the authors’ possible explanation for why children prenatally exposed to
alcohol may be at higher risk for mood disorders?
(5) Although the researchers do not address the question of environmental risk factors,
how might these contribute to the high rate of psychiatric disorders in this population?
Mash/Wolfe Abnormal Child Psychology, 4th edition
(6) After reading this article, discuss your thoughts as to other possible etiologies of the
psychiatric disorders seen within this population and how you might conduct a follow-up
study to examine these.