Children raised in poverty suffer many ill effects: They often have health problems and tend to struggle in school, which can create a cycle of poverty across generations.
Now research is providing what could be crucial clues to explain how childhood poverty translates into dimmer chances of success: Chronic stress from growing up poor appears to have a direct impact on the brain, leaving children with impairment in at least one key area — working memory.
“There’s been lots of evidence that low-income families are under tremendous amounts of stress, and we know that stress has many implications,” said Gary Evans, a professor of human ecology at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., who led the research. “What this data raises is the possibility that it’s also related to cognitive development.”
The findings were published online last week by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
