The McClatchy-Tribune News Service (7/6) reported that according to a study published recently in the journal Biological Psychiatry, researchers have “shown that chronic stress of poverty, neglect and physical abuse in early life may shrink the parts of a child’s developing brain responsible for memory, learning and processing emotion.”
The two parts of the brain involved are the hippocampus and the amygdala. The study involved 128 12-year-olds, all of whom underwent magnetic resonance imaging scans.
Related Links:
— “Researchers: Early stress from poverty hurts brain development,” McClatchy-Tribune News Service, Detroit Free Press, July 6, 2014.