New Study Claims BPA Exposure Lasts for Generations

A recent study has reportedly claimed that the first generation of mouse offspring exposed to bisphenol A (BPA) before birth “displayed fewer social interactions as compared with control mice, whereas in later generations… the effect of BPA was to increase these social interactions.” Jennifer Wolstenholme, et al., “Gestational Exposure to Bisphenol A Produces Transgenerational Changes in Behaviors and Gene Expression,” Endocrinology, June 2012. After feeding BPA-laced chow to female mice during mating and pregnancy, researchers evidently noted that the brains of embryos exposed to BPA “had lower gene transcript levels for several estrogen receptors, oxytocin, and vasopressin as compared with controls,” with decreased vasopressin mRNA persisting into the fourth generation, “at which time oxytocin was also reduced but only in males.”

According to the authors, their results “demonstrated for the first time… that a common and widespread EDC [endrocine-disrupting chemical] has transgenerational actions on social behavior and neural expression of at least the genes for vasopressin and oxytocin. Because exposure to BPA changes social interactions at a dose within the reported human levels, it is possible that this compound has transgenerational actions on human behavior.”