Brain Scans Show the Impact of Neglect On a Child's Brain Size

An anonymous reader writes "A shocking comparison of brain scans from two three-year-old children reveals new evidence of the remarkable impact a mother's love has on a child's brain development. The chilling images reveal that the left brain, which belongs to a normal 3-year-old, is significantly larger and contains fewer spots and dark 'fuzzy' areas than the right brain, which belongs to that of a 3-year-old who has suffered extreme neglect. Neurologists say that the latest images provide more evidence that the way children are treated in their early years is important not only for the child's emotional development, but also in determining the size of their brains. Experts say that the sizeable difference in the two brains is primarily caused by the difference in the way each child was treated by their mothers."

Comments

Re:Any other variables..?

[timeOday]

Forget nutrition; with n=1, even random variation (i.e. something other than parents' gene pool, nutrition, or parenting) could account for it. The article mentions a study from UCLA, so probably there's more behind this than is included in the (very lame) article.

Doing controlled studies of the effects of parental neglect in humans would require a horribly un-ethical study, but the findings in controlled studies of rats and monkeys have been consistent. Leaving your baby stuck in a crib all day until it forgets how to cry for help is not something you want to do.

Sample size of two

[J'raxis]

Your "study's" sample size is two. But gratuitous use of words like "shocking" and "chilling" will probably make most people ignore that.

Re:Sample size?

[codebonobo]

The original research cites many studies of sample sizes of 1000, 200, 122, ect. Here is the cited research: http://www.childtrauma.org/images/stories/Articles/mindbrain.pdf without the obnoxious ads.