Comment on 'Prenatal maternal anxiety and children's brain structure and function: A systematic review of neuroimaging studies' (Adamson et al., J Affect Disord 2018, 241, 117-126)

Abstract

In the review article by Adamson, Letourneau and Lebel (J Affect Disord 2018, 241, 117-126) the article of Mennes, Van den Bergh, Lagae & Stiers (Clin Neurophysiolol 2009, 120, 116-1122) was rated as "weak, due to lack of information provided regarding the sample population of mothers". However, Mennes et al. (2009) had referred to previous articles describing data and results of earlier waves. Unfortunately, this went unnoticed, most probably because of the use of an automatic extraction method and/or inaccurate verification of the data extraction tool. Moreover, Adamson et al. (2018) omit in Table 1 and in several sections of the text, crucial information that was provided in Mennes et al. (2009), pertaining to measurement of maternal state and trait anxiety, measurement of maternal anxiety at three times during pregnancy and the use of postnatal maternal trait anxiety as a control variable. In this letter we have clarified why the manuscript of Mennes et al. (2009) was not fully appreciated and kindly ask the authors of the review paper to add a corrigendum in which the remarks are considered.