Maternal caffeine intake during pregnancy and child neurodevelopment up to eight years of age-Results from the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study

Abstract

Purpose: Current knowledge of the effect of prenatal caffeine exposure on the child's neurodevelopment is contradictory. The current study aimed to study whether caffeine intake during pregnancy was associated with impaired child neurodevelopment up to 8 years of age.

Method: A total of 64,189 full term pregnancies from the Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study were included. A validated food-frequency questionnaire administered at gestational week 22 was used to obtain information on maternal caffeine intake from different sources. To assess child neurodevelopment (behaviour, temperament, motor development, language difficulties) validated scales were used to identify difficulties within each domain at 6, 18, 36 months as well as 5 and 8 years of age. Adjusted logistic regression models and mixed linear models were used to evaluate neurodevelopmental problems associated with maternal caffeine intake.

Results: Prenatal caffeine exposure was not associated with a persistently increased risk for behaviour, temperament, motor or language problems in children born at full-term. Results were consistent throughout all follow-ups and for different sources of caffeine intake. There was a minor trend towards an association between consumption of caffeinated soft drinks and high activity level, but this association was not driven by caffeine.

Conclusion: Low to moderate caffeine consumption during pregnancy was not associated with any persistent adverse effects concerning the child's neurodevelopment up to 8 years of age. However, a few previous studies indicate an association between high caffeine consumption and negative neurodevelopment outcomes.

Keywords: Child neurodevelopment; Maternal caffeine intake; MoBa; The Norwegian Mother, Father and Child Cohort Study.

Fig. 1

Flow chart inclusion and exclusion criteria and number of children at each follow-up. Women were recruited to MoBa between 1999 and 2008. The MoBa FFQ for assessment of caffeine intake was taken into use from 2002 and onwards, explaining the large proportion of missing information on caffeine intake (n = 24 782 (23%)) for live born singleton deliveries

Fig. 2

Percentage of total caffeine intake per caffeine source