Project Summary

Brian M. D'Onofrio, Ph.D. (Young Investigator 2007) of Indiana University, will study parental depression and selection factors, characteristics that influence both parents and children, accounting for increased levels of depression in the children (both generations). Dr. D’Onofrio will use a quasi-experimental approach, the Children of Twins design (CoT), that can identify genetic factors common to parents and children, unmeasured environmental influences that affect both generations, and environmentally mediated processes specifically associated with parental depression. Instead of comparing children of depressed parents to unrelated offspring from families with no history of depression, the approach compares offspring of twins where one co-twin has depression and one co-twin does not. Dr. D’Onofrio’s design provides a purer test of the causal influence of parental depression and that can be used in the future to test alternative causal processes that may be responsible for the intergenerational transmission of depression.

Program Area: MOOD DISORDERS\Unipolar

Search Again