Slashdot Mirror
Poverty May Affect the Growth of Children's Brains
sciencehabit writes: Stark and rising inequality plagues many countries, including the United States, and politicians, economists, and — fortunately — scientists, are debating its causes and solutions. But inequality's effects may go beyond simple access to opportunity: a new study finds that family differences in income and education are directly correlated with brain size in developing children and adolescents. The findings could have important policy implications and provide new arguments for early antipoverty interventions, researchers say.
most of our ruling class aren't poor!
Don't conflate intelligence (or, in the case of TFA, certain aspects of learning and higher order function) with social success. Politics is more emotional than technical. It is abundantly clear that intelligence (whatever the hell that actually happens to be), the ability to learn, the ability to think have only a modest bearing on what happens to an individual throughout their lives.
Besides, the actual magnitude of the effect in TFA seems rather small - there are likely a number of other factors involved to determine if you are fated to be Steve Woz or Idi Amin.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Why isn't everyone entitled to a brain of the same size, if it's feasible?
The language you use there is weird. The world is cold and hard, and any of us could be dead tomorrow; entitlements aren't a god-given right, there's no such thing (and that's true whether you're atheist or strongly believe in God).
Why don't you say, "hey guys, these poor people are out there with deficient brains, let's go help them!" Helping people is something we can actually accomplish as a society, and saying it like that would rally a lot more people to the cause.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Being somewhat above or below median brain size does not equate to better or worse mental faculties. One has to be far, far worse off in the smaller department before it actually starts to be relevant, and that's usually because whole structures are malformed or missing.
If anything in poverty affects brain development I expect that it's chemical or in the way that structures are formed. It's been demonstrated that some structures are larger in both musicians and mathematicians and that there's a direct correlation, the brain improves that structure as the person develops the skill.
I'm going to venture a guess that some people that are poor, particularly those that do not find themselves in a position to really be able to make important choices due to financial constraints or to exercise their brains in higher thinking, will have brains less suited to that kind of decision making until they're forced to start making those kinds of decisions regularly. I expect conversely that many wealthy people that have never been poor can't empathize with the poor because they simply have no idea how to do so, that their brains do not understand the concepts of making very seemingly small decisions that actually are very important when one has almost no resources.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
The link is between nutrition and brain development, and considering the odds of poor nutrition is higher in poorer families than in wealthier families, the conclusion does not seem bad at all. Nothing says that all families that live in poverty will have children with developmental problems, but it does argue you're much more likely to see the phenomenon in such families.
I can't imagine why anyone would see this as controversial.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
We get more from taxes. A poor person may get a pittance for food and lodging, but we, and by that I mean middle class professionals, get roads on which to drive our nice cars, police protection for our belongings, safe streets around where we live... and basically a nice life. And yes, we get it from the society that is made possible by taxes.
If you are one of the brainless retards who think that their guns and mad macho skillz will keep them on top if there is a breakdown in law and order, I won't even bother arguing with you. I'll just say that I lived through Bulgaria's transition from a police state to a society run by organized not-quite-criminals, and saw how happy people were to see an end of the truly lawless times.
Without taxes, there is no law enforcement. Without law enforcement, there is no security. No one is tough enough to guarantee their own security without organizing with like minded and skilled people. Once they have organized, they decide that they don't be keeping themselves secure, they are protecting others as well, and... start collecting taxes.
No good deed goes unpunished...
Total government expenditures in the US were around 10% of GDP in 1930. Was the US a lawless hellhole at 10%?
Cause it's around 40% today.
The link is between nutrition and brain development, and considering the odds of poor nutrition is higher in poorer families than in wealthier families, the conclusion does not seem bad at all. Nothing says that all families that live in poverty will have children with developmental problems, but it does argue you're much more likely to see the phenomenon in such families.
I can't imagine why anyone would see this as controversial.
EXACTLY...
For instance, there is a whole generation in North Korea where starvation was common during the second Kim's reign and they show marked problems with mental development if they where malnourished during specific phases of their development. They will NEVER recover, nor will they reach their potential but the real tragedy is that this will affect their children too. So you loose not one but two generations. (According to the documentary I remember watching once.)
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
This study may only be referenced by Liberals when promoting new ways to take from those who produce.
You mean the workers on the production lines? because those are the only ones who do any producing.
Rich people allocate capital and if they do it well this is a Good Thing (TM), but certainly on and itself does not produce anything.
The link is between nutrition and brain development
Could it also be related to poorer parents working more hours, thus having less time to be with the kids during their early years playing with them, reading for them and otherwise stimulating their brain development? Or has that been corrected for?
The intentional homicide rate in the 1930s in the US was more than twice what it is today. So, yes.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L...
We could do that. We could take all children away from the parents as soon as they are born and make them wards of the state. That way they would all get the same amount of attention and stimulation at an early age, the same nutrition, the same access to the same government schools, etc...
I don't know why you think so.
Here's an interview on PBS: "I went to visit indigenous people and hunter-gatherers...they don’t get that much meat because hunting is hard work."
Look at the chart half-way down, of some of the hunter/gatherer tribes that still exist. There is huge variety in one they eat....some are mostly meat, some are mostly plants.
The Paleo diet today isn't good for your health.
Unsurprisingly, here is a study in Nature that points out copying Paleolithic diets would not be very useful anyway (not in the least because we've evolved since then, through the Neolithic era).
The paleo diet is yet another fully trademarked fad diet.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
The world is cold and hard as we allow it to be. It is a *choice*, albeit one made by default for people who think like you.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
The world is cold and hard as we allow it to be.
Then allow it to end death: for that is the coldest and hardest thing we all face.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
As a teacher for over 15 years , public subsidized populations are usually the result of unplanned pregnancy and parents drink, smoke and don't take prenatal precautions that regular parents do . Low income Mexican and Asian immigrants parents take care of themselves public assistant parents do not . Iq is lower on average vs normal children . Major prenatal outreach is needed before children get pregnant
Well I suppose it depends on what you consider to be "coming up with a better solution". If you mean figuring out where money is better spend on improving society, then lots of people have already come up with better solutions. If you mean figuring out a way to convince a democratic country full of idiots voting for other idiots to do anything right, then the fact that we still have this particular problem is pretty good evidence that no one has figured out the solution yet.
Yes, living in the 1930's would be hell for anyone accustomed to modern living.
Cheap storage VM.
Are you statistically the same as the studied subjects?
Nope, you are an outlier. Thanks for your Republicanism, but try actually understanding things.
In places like that there is an abundance of inexpensive garbage filled with very stimulating ingredients and an uphill battle towards the less available, more expensive, all-natural options. This is why there's a bizarre regulatory mess in South LA about curbing the number of fast food joints all packed into a concentrated area.
See in this video where the chef teaches some kids how to make home made breaded chicken breast, but they still find the McNugget more appealing. It reminds me of Dave Chappelle's old sketch about the rich kids having grape juice where he only knew "grape drink."
I think that's just a small part of it, I know plenty of rich people who give their children junk food, and poor people who make a big effort to only buy healthy stuff.
I think the researchers simply got cause and effect mixed up.
People with smaller brains tend to end up with a lower income and get less education. And their kids end up inheriting the smaller brain from their parents.
Obviously that doesn't mean than all poor people are stupid, just that statistically, people with larger brains tend to do better in life, and this results in a correlation when you look at a sufficiently large number of people.
Makes a lot more sense to me.
There is strong evidence that the lead ban had a direct causal impact on lowering the crime rate post-1990.
But it couldn't have been a factor in 1930 since the lead pollution levels at that time was still ridiculously low. The single biggest contributor: tetra-ethyl-lead (as was used in gasoline) wasn't even invented yet.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *
There are no studies that show spanking has any long term positive outcomes. There are plenty of studies that show negative correlation with long term negative outcomes. Just as is the case with this study, it is fair to call into question correlation and causation but if there were some food additive, fertilizer or herbicide that had even 1/10 of the correlative impact on children, the public would be freaking out and protesting around some multinational business but when it is parents damaging their own children we get relative silence.
Studies have shown that poor parents are more likely to spank their children. Studies have shown a correlation in spanking with smaller brain sizes, lower IQs, lack of self control. Studies have shown a high correlation between lack of self control and poverty. Again we don't have great data on cause v.s. effect but there are good indications that the early violence is causative in this chain.
--- Liberty in our Lifetime
was it like that when growing up?
also, what about the parents brain size?
what kind of poverty are we talking here anyhow? if you have money to feed your kids with overpriced flavored ice just wtf kind of poverty is that compared to europe directly after and during ww2?+??
or is it that if the parents constantly tell their kids that they are poor, then their brains don't grow?
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
I don't think you understand what "equality of opportunity" means. For example, it means that all children would have the opportunity to get a high quality education. Obviously some children are less bright than others, but the high quality education is offered to everyone. More over, children shouldn't be disadvantaged because of their parents failings, because that isn't fair to them. That's one of the reasons why children must attend school by law in most countries - even if the parents would prefer them to stay at home or work they must be given the opportunity to learn.
As for jobs, equality of opportunity means that everyone can apply for a particular job, i.e. the employer can't arbitrarily discriminate against say Latino people. It also means that we should try to make high quality jobs available everywhere, or ensure that people can relocate if necessary without artificial barriers. Imagine there was some bright kid just out of college who couldn't afford to move to where high end jobs in his field were. Someone might decide to help give him the opportunity to apply for and get those jobs by offering assistance to move.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC