We are thrilled to announce that our PhD researcher Franziska Weinmar has published a new paper!
Pregnancy involves major hormonal and brain changes, but how these affect emotion regulation has been unclear.
In the first task-based fMRI study on this topic, we compared healthy pregnant women to non-pregnant women. The results showed that both groups regulated emotions equally well, with no significant differences in brain activity in the whole brain and the frontal region. However, in pregnant women, higher amygdala activity was linked to lower regulation success and more depressive symptoms—suggesting a potential early neural marker for peripartum mental health risk.
Thank you to all the women who participated and collaborators who contributed to this work!