Pregnant Smokers Have Aggressive Kids

CBC Montreal

Women who smoke when pregnant are more likely to have agressive children. That's the conclusion of a report made public at an international conference on aggression in Montreal.

The number of women who smoke is expected to more than double in the next 30 years

For the first time scientists have shown a link between mothers who smoke and aggressive behaviour among young children.

The children hit more, they grab toys from other children, and they're antisocial, according to Dr. Lauren Wakschlag, of the University of Chicago Hospital's Child Psychiatry Department.

"Infants who are exposed to half a pack a day or more throughout the course of the pregnancy had a rapidly-escalating pattern of agression from 12-24 months," she says.

Triple chances of agression

Wakschlag says a mother who smokes is up to three times more likely to have an agressive child especially if that child is a boy.

She's reluctant to say what happens to the unborn child's body to cause the change in behaviour.

But scientists who do similar experiments on animals say a fetus's brain develops very rapidly and smoking interferes with the way that development takes place.

"Troubling"

Paul Gendrault, professor of psycho-education at the University of Montreal, says Wakschlag's report is worrying because the number of women who smoke is expected to more than double in the next 30 years.

"Especially in third world countries where medical care is the lowest. It will just increase the poverty in these countries and make a lot more babies that will be affected by tobacco smoke," Gendrault says.

The scentists call on governments to do more to help mothers stop smoking.