self-reported highest level of education, area deprivation index, and maternal nutrition. The area deprivation index is a geotracking measure that ranks neighborhoods by socioeconomic disadvantage compared with the national average based on census block data, including factors for the domains of income, education, employment, and housing quality (40,44). Maternal nutrition was assessed using the Healthy Eating Index, a validated dietary assessment tool available through the National Institutes of Health used to measure diet quality based on U.S. Dietary Guidelines for Americans (45,46). Dietary information for Healthy Eating Index calculation was obtained using the Diet History Questionnaire (47,48). Higher scores on the advantage factor represent higher levels of advantage, whereas lower scores represent lower levels of advantage (mean = 0, SD = 1). Lead levels were not included in the advantage composite; however, because lead has previously been related to crime (49), additional analyses controlled for census-tract lead levels using data from the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services (see the Supplement for details). The components of the psychosocial stress factor included measures of prenatal depression, perceived stress, lifetime stressor exposure, and racial discrimination. Prenatal depression was measured using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (50) at each trimester. Perceived stress was assessed at each trimester using the Perceived Stress Scale (51). Lifetime exposure to major life stressors was measured using the total count and severity scores from the Stress and Adversity Inventory (52). Experiences of racial discrimination were assessed using the Everyday Discrimination Scale (53). Higher scores on the psychosocial stress factor represent higher levels of psychosocial stress, whereas lower scores represent lower levels of psychosocial stress (mean = 0, SD = 1). Race itself was not included in the models because it is not a biologically meaningful variable and is instead a proxy for racism and discrimination, which were assessed. Data Analysis All analyses were conducted using R and RStudio, specially using the tidyverse, psych, and stats packages (54,55). Distributions of and correlations between crime levels, adversity, and stressors were examined. Initial bivariate correlations between crime rates and hypothesized frontolimbic neonatal brain connections were computed and corrected for multiple comparisons using the Benjamini-Hochberg procedure for false discovery rate in the corr.test function from the psych package (56). Frontolimbic regions were chosen based on prior research (limbic structures: amygdala, hippocampus, thalamus; frontal regions: anterior DMN [aDMN] and anterior frontal parietal network) (Figure 2). Two negative control regions (motor-motor and motor-aDMN) that have not been previously associated with crime exposure were also examined. For a complete bivariate correlation table with corrected p values, see Table S1. Significant bivariate associations were then further related to property and violent crimes in separate linear regression models controlling for GA at birth and PMA at scan (sex was considered but was not related to the independent or dependent variables). Each set of linear regressions (i.e., property and violent crimes) were corrected for multiple comparisons again using the Benjamini-Hochberg procedure for false discovery rate correction (56,57). Next, the adversity composite was added to the models to determine whether neighborhood crime had an effect on neonatal brain function over and above other forms of adversity. Results were once again corrected for multiple comparisons using the false discovery rate procedure (56,57), and the full set of tests are described in the results. Finally, we examined potential mediators of the associations that remained significant after controlling for advantage and correcting for multiple comparisons. Mediation models were then tested for significant connections using the psychosocial stress variable as a mediator and nonparametrically bootstrapped using 1000 simulations with the mediation package in R (58). RESULTS Associations Between Crime, Adversity, and Psychosocial Stress High levels of block group violent crime were negatively related to advantage, meaning that disadvantaged mothers tended to live in areas with higher crime levels, whereas advantaged participants tended to live in areas with low crime levels (r = 20.52, 95% CI = 20.59 to 20.43, p , .001) (Figure 3A). Disadvantaged mothers (n = 193; advantage z scores , 0) were widely distributed across both safe and dangerous Figure 2. The brain regions of interest (teal = amygdala; pink = hippocampus; green = thalamus; red = anterior default mode network; navy = anterior frontal parietal network) on the neonatal brain. The facial reconstruction was created from an atlas containing multiple neonatal scans. Prenatal Crime Exposure and Neonatal Brain Function 4 Biological Psychiatry - -, 2022; -:-–- www.sobp.org/journal Biological Psychiatry neighborhoods, whereas advantaged mothers (n = 126, advantage z scores . 0) were clustered in safe neighborhoods with low levels of violent crimes (Figure S2). Greater levels of violent crime were also associated with more psychosocial stress in mothers (r = 0.25, 95% CI = 0.14 to 0.35, p , .001) (Figure 3B).