Bingzi Shang’s research while affiliated with Fudan University and other places

Background Providing responsive caregiving might benefit children’s cognitive and emotional development, but the role of infancy responsive caregiving trajectory is unclear. This birth cohort study aimed to examine the effect of infancy responsive caregiving trajectory on children’s emotional and behavioral problems (EBPs) at 2 and 3–5 years old. Methods A total of 2321 mother-child dyads from Shanghai Maternal-Child Pairs Cohort (Shanghai MCPC) were included in this study. Responsive caregiving was assessed using questionnaires at 2-, 6-, and 12-month old. The Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) was used to assess children’s EBPs. Group-based trajectory model (GBTM) was used to identify responsive caregiving trajectory. Ordered logistic regression was fitted to analyse the association of responsive caregiving trajectories and children’s EBPs. Results The study participants were categorized into four trajectory groups: Increasing group (n = 26, 1.12%), Fluctuating group (n = 366, 15.77%), Decline group (n = 125, 5.39%), And normal group (n = 1804, 77.73%). Compared to children in normal group, children in decline group had significantly increased risk of emotional symptoms, conduct problems, peer problems and prosocial behavior problems at 2 years old (aOR = 3.49, 2.70, 3.67 and 1.96), also conduct problems and hyperactivity at 3–5 years old (aOR = 1.96, 1.85). Children in fluctuating group had increased risk of hyperactivity and prosocial behavior problems at 2 years old (aOR = 1.81, 1.63), and prosocial behavior problems at 3–5 years old (aOR = 1.41). While, children increasing group did not show any increased risks of EBPs at 2 and 3–5 years old. Conclusions Consistently decreasing, low-level fluctuations in responsive caregiving during infancy could increase the risks of children’s EBPs. Maintaining consistent and stable level of responsive caregiving during infancy had beneficial effects on children’s emotional development.

In this study, our aim was to investigate the potential correlation between the mother’s total gestational weight gain (GWG) rate and the trimester-specific GWG rate (GWGR) with the physical development status of the child within 24 months of age. We utilized linear regression models and linear mixed effects models to explore both time point and longitudinal relationships between GWGR and children’s anthropometric outcome z-scores at 0, 1, 2, 4, 6, 9, 12, 18, and 24 months. To examine the critical exposure windows, we employed multiple informant models. We also conducted a stratified analysis considering pre-pregnancy BMI and the gender of the children. Our findings revealed notable positive associations between total GWGR and z-scores for body mass index for age (BMIZ), head circumference for age (HCZ), weight for age (WAZ), length for age (LAZ), and weight for length (WHZ) across different trimesters of pregnancy (pint < 0.05). The GWGR during the first two trimesters mainly influenced the relationship between total GWGR and BMIZ, WAZ, and LAZ, while the GWGR during the first trimester had a significant impact on the correlation with HCZ (0.206, 95% CI 0.090 to 0.322). Notably, the associations of GWGR and children’s BMIZ were pronounced in male children and pre-pregnancy normal-weight women. In conclusion, our study findings indicated that a higher GWGR during each trimester was associated with greater physical growth during the first 24 months of life, especially GWGR in the first and second trimesters.