Smoking
During Pregnancy can result in Child Behavioral Problems
In the Medical Tribune
June 24, 1999 is an article reporting that New York Researchers have found
that women who smoke during pregnancy may increase the chance of their
children having certain behavioral disorders.
For years there has been a well-established connection between low
birth-weight and mothers who smoke. But
this new evidence shows the longer term effects of smoking during
pregnancy.
The New York study
examined 50 people whose mothers smoked 10 or more cigarettes per day
during pregnancy and compared them to 97 whose mothers did not smoke. The research showed that sons of smoking mothers were four
times more likely to develop a conduct disorder and or behavioral
disorders marked by excessive disobedience, aggression and antisocial
behavior. Daughters were five
times more likely to be drug dependant teenagers.
Previous research also
linked smoking mothers to attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
A 1996 study of 140 boys with ADHD showed 22 percent of the boys
with ADHD had mothers who smoked compared with only 8% of those who whose
mother didn’t smoke.
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