Being raised in an impoverished environment is connected to various negative effects. Now, a group of researchers from Washington University St. Louis was also able to find a link between poverty and altered brain connectivity and childhood depression.
The scientists were able to discover that children from poor families have brain connectivities different from those from affluent families.
The particular deviation was noted in the hippocampus and amygdala, which are responsible for the cognitive and emotional processes in the brain, respectively. The researchers described the brain connectivities in these regions as weaker in poor children than in children with rich families.
The team observed that the degree of weakness in brain connectivities depends on the level of poverty to which the child was subjected to. Hence the poorer the family, the weaker the connection of the hippocampus and amygdala is to the other parts of the brain.
Aside from poor brain links, the authors found that poor preschool children had a higher risk of developing clinical depression when they reached the age of 9 or 10 years old. However, the researchers also note that these changes may be halted by parental nurturance.
To perform their study, the researchers identified children aged between 3 to 5 years old from day-care centers. They then performed annual behavioral assessment up until the children turned 12 years old.
Healthy children and those who showed signs of clinical depression underwent functional MRI when they reached the school age of 7 to 12 years old. The experts then studied the participants' functional connectivity with the right and left hippocampus and amygdala while at rest.
First author Deanna M. Barch says the results of the study do not necessarily mean that a poor child is bound to have a difficult life.
"Many things can be done to foster brain development and positive emotional development," she says.
The study encourages people to remember that the adverse things that happen during the early stages of life influence brain development and function. In the end, Barch says people have to perform actions early on so children may be swayed toward the best possible developmental outcomes.
The study was published in The American Journal of Psychiatry on Jan. 15.
