It is well known that love and care are extremely important for children. Scientists in Romania researched the exact effects that childhood neglect has on our brain.
Our brains take a good 20 years to develop – no other living being takes longer. From birth, our nerve cells begin to network at an unimaginable speed; from the age of 10, the synapses become fewer. Scientists in Romania researched the effects of neglect and a lack of caregivers in childhood on our brain. There appears to be a sensitive period in brain development that affects our intelligence.
By the age of three, children have twice as many synapses as adults
Our brain is the center of emotional experience and controls all vital bodily functions. It consists of a huge network of nerve cells that communicate with each other using electrical impulses. How these are linked depends on what the neural network needs to be able to do. In a process that lasts around 20 years, it is continually adapted to the requirements of reality.
A newborn starts life with around 100 billion nerve cells that developed before birth. From the moment of birth, the cells begin to network – around 700 new cell connections are created every second. At two years old, toddlers have as many synapses as adults and at three years old they have twice as many.
When neglected, the brain grows without a goal
The number of synapses remains constant until the age of around 10 – a sign of the enormous learning ability at this age. After that it decreases by about half. Connection points that are not used and therefore apparently not needed are broken down in the brain, even in infancy. In this way, what children experience, experience and learn influences the structure of the brain.
When children are neglected – i.e. they cannot explore their surroundings and no one speaks to them – the neural network grows aimlessly. Learning disorders or memory problems can then occur.
The “Bucharest Early Intervention Project” draws new insights
A study by the “Bucharest Early Intervention Project”, a project by scientists from various universities, looked at 136 children in Romania starting in 2000. All children had been placed in children’s homes at the time of their birth, so they had no real caregiver. Half of the children were placed in foster families, while the others grew up in homes. They were then examined at the ages of 2, 3, 4, 8, 12 and 16 years.
The results of the study suggest that early institutionalization can lead to both profound deficits in intelligence and disturbed socio-emotional behaviors. The children who grew up in the homes, for example, showed deficits in their attachment behavior and language skills and were more prone to psychiatric impairments.
The children who were placed in foster care, however, developed better – and also differed in their intelligence. Although all children had a fairly low intelligence quotient, the children who were placed in foster care before the age of two performed better on IQ tests in adolescence.
The “sensitive phase” of the ability to think
This result, published in 2023, is groundbreaking in two ways. The difference in the children’s ability to think can be attributed to the care situation in infancy and there could be a so-called “sensitive phase” for the development of the ability to think. These are time windows in which the brain is particularly susceptible to experiences.
There are probably various sensitive phases in brain development – although how many are still unknown. The brain regions do not all mature at the same speed. It is therefore quite possible that a window of opportunity for the development of intelligence closes after the first two years of life. The earlier a child is placed in a foster family, the better they develop.
That’s why it’s particularly important for children in this phase to have contact with the environment and people and to experience sufficient interaction and feedback in order to best support the parts of the brain that are able and willing to learn.
Sources used: bucharestearlyinterventionproject.org, neurologen-und-psychiater-im-netz.org, nzz.ch