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Authors’ response to commentary by DeCasper et al . on Kisilevsky and Hains, ‘Onset and maturation of fetal heart rate response to the mother’s voice over late gestation’

Authors’ response to commentary by DeCasper et al . on Kisilevsky and Hains, ‘Onset and... In keeping with a long tradition in developmental research, this article reports an observational description of the onset and maturation of heart rate (HR) responses to the mother’s voice from 29 weeks gestational age (GA) to term in fetuses in low‐risk pregnancies delivering as healthy, term infants. Fetuses were assigned to 3‐week GA groups for the analyses of the auditory elicited responses because of ongoing maturational changes in the cardiac and other systems. For brief reviews of the maturation of fetal heart rate and methodological issues in human fetal research see Kisilevsky and Hains (2010) . The data presented here were derived from a number of parent studies in which the fetal response to the mother’s voice showed significant differences when compared to other voices (e.g. female stranger, father; Kisilevsky, Hains, Brown, Lee, Cowperthwaite, Stutzman, Swansburg, Lee, Xie, Huang, Ye, Zhang & Wang, 2009 ) and between low‐ and high‐risk pregnancy groups (e.g. maternal smoking, Cowperthwaite, Hains & Kisilevsky, 2007 ; hypertension, Lee, Brown, Hains & Kisilevsky, 2007 ). While these studies addressed research questions related to attention and memory, they were not designed to address onset and maturational changes in HR. Over the years, they have provided the systematically accumulated data on fetal response to the mother’s voice used here. Presently, there is no ‘gold standard’ for the analysis of continuous fetal HR data; we chose to use the robust repeated measures ANOVA with an appropriate correction for violations of sphericity where necessary. The results of the SPSS analyses are accurately reflected except for one typographical error (page 5, column 1, paragraph 2, line 6) which may lead to some confusion. In the comparison of heart rate between the pre‐ and voice periods, the F ‐value for the Period difference is 3.96, not 3.06. By term, 83% of fetuses showed increased HR during the mother’s voice which persisted following voice offset, replicating our previous work with Chinese voices ( Kisilevsky, Hains, Lee, Xie, Huang, Ye, Zhang & Wang, 2003 ). Clearly, there is something special about her voice; we have not yet found a similar response to any other voice. So, whatever the underlying mechanisms, response to the mother’s voice gives us a glimpse into the development of the CNS/cardiac response system over the last trimester of pregnancy. The findings of this study are considered in light of these changes and we speculate in the Discussion section. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Developmental Science Wiley

Authors’ response to commentary by DeCasper et al . on Kisilevsky and Hains, ‘Onset and maturation of fetal heart rate response to the mother’s voice over late gestation’

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References (57)

Publisher
Wiley
Copyright
© 2011 Blackwell Publishing Ltd
ISSN
1363-755X
eISSN
1467-7687
DOI
10.1111/j.1467-7687.2010.01028.x
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

In keeping with a long tradition in developmental research, this article reports an observational description of the onset and maturation of heart rate (HR) responses to the mother’s voice from 29 weeks gestational age (GA) to term in fetuses in low‐risk pregnancies delivering as healthy, term infants. Fetuses were assigned to 3‐week GA groups for the analyses of the auditory elicited responses because of ongoing maturational changes in the cardiac and other systems. For brief reviews of the maturation of fetal heart rate and methodological issues in human fetal research see Kisilevsky and Hains (2010) . The data presented here were derived from a number of parent studies in which the fetal response to the mother’s voice showed significant differences when compared to other voices (e.g. female stranger, father; Kisilevsky, Hains, Brown, Lee, Cowperthwaite, Stutzman, Swansburg, Lee, Xie, Huang, Ye, Zhang & Wang, 2009 ) and between low‐ and high‐risk pregnancy groups (e.g. maternal smoking, Cowperthwaite, Hains & Kisilevsky, 2007 ; hypertension, Lee, Brown, Hains & Kisilevsky, 2007 ). While these studies addressed research questions related to attention and memory, they were not designed to address onset and maturational changes in HR. Over the years, they have provided the systematically accumulated data on fetal response to the mother’s voice used here. Presently, there is no ‘gold standard’ for the analysis of continuous fetal HR data; we chose to use the robust repeated measures ANOVA with an appropriate correction for violations of sphericity where necessary. The results of the SPSS analyses are accurately reflected except for one typographical error (page 5, column 1, paragraph 2, line 6) which may lead to some confusion. In the comparison of heart rate between the pre‐ and voice periods, the F ‐value for the Period difference is 3.96, not 3.06. By term, 83% of fetuses showed increased HR during the mother’s voice which persisted following voice offset, replicating our previous work with Chinese voices ( Kisilevsky, Hains, Lee, Xie, Huang, Ye, Zhang & Wang, 2003 ). Clearly, there is something special about her voice; we have not yet found a similar response to any other voice. So, whatever the underlying mechanisms, response to the mother’s voice gives us a glimpse into the development of the CNS/cardiac response system over the last trimester of pregnancy. The findings of this study are considered in light of these changes and we speculate in the Discussion section.

Journal

Developmental Science – Wiley

Published: Mar 1, 2011

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