Identifying the contributions of gestational and caregiving environments to socioeconomic disparities in child language and cognitive development.

项目摘要/摘要 在美国，儿童的发展因其家庭的社会经济地位而明显不同 (S)。一些最显著和最重要的SES差异是在语言和认知方面 发展，早在两岁时就很明显，通过幼儿园入学，预测令人沮丧 孩子们的长期学习轨迹的准确性。然而，尽管社会科学已经确定了各种结构， 造成儿童发展差异的背景因素和心理因素，我们有限 了解这些因素如何“深入皮下”以影响近端的生物过程 参与大脑成熟并塑造关键的发育结果。该提案将以下方法整合在一起 从生物和心理科学的角度理解发展差异。世界上的理论家 生物科学提出，在怀孕期间，劣势在生物上根深蒂固，部分是通过 对导致“不良妊娠环境”(AGEs)的压力的免疫反应。动物研究表明 确认应激暴露会导致不良的妊娠环境和随后的 氧化性神经元损伤和发育受损，然而人类研究尚未检查AGEs是否 与语言和认知方面的社会经济差异有关。我们利用美国国立卫生研究院资助的一项现有研究 围产期结局的差异，其中对SES和妊娠环境的深入评估是 在600名来自不同背景的孕妇身上进行了测试。我们将跟踪这些孩子的情况 个人，收集婴幼儿时期认知和语言发展的测量数据 作为5岁学龄前儿童的学习成绩。目标1将确定不良妊娠环境是否由 母亲的压力调节了儿童语言和认知发展的社会经济差异。目标2将 加深对不良妊娠环境的胎盘特征的理解 语言和认知发展水平较低。目标3将审查年龄和年龄的综合贡献 产后照料环境对语言和认知发展的预测作用。在这些目标中，我们 利用社会、行为和生物科学的最新方法，采用文化和 评估儿童语言和认知发展的语言响应性方法。这项研究将 回答有关SES在语言和认知发展方面的差异的起源的关键问题 对理论、政策和实践的重要影响。

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT In the United States, children’s development differs markedly as a function of their family’s socioeconomic status (SES). Some of the most pronounced and consequential SES disparities are in language and cognitive development, which are evident as early as two years of age and, by kindergarten entry, predict with depressing accuracy children’s long-term academic trajectories. Yet while social science has identified a variety of structural, contextual, and psychological factors that contribute to disparities in child development, we have limited understanding of how these factors “get under the skin” to influence biological processes that are proximally involved in brain maturation and shape key developmental outcomes. This proposal integrates approaches to understanding developmental disparities from the biological and psychological sciences. Theorists in the biological sciences have proposed that disadvantage gets biologically embedded during gestation, in part via immune responses to stress that result in “adverse gestational environments” (AGEs). Animal studies have confirmed that stressful exposures can contribute to adverse gestational environments and to subsequent oxidative neuronal injury and impaired development, yet human studies have yet to examine whether AGEs are associated with socioeconomic disparities in language and cognition. We leverage an existing NIH-funded study of disparities in perinatal outcomes, where in-depth assessments of SES and the gestational environment are being performed in 600 pregnant individuals from diverse backgrounds. We will follow children born to these individuals, collecting measures of cognitive and language development during the infant-toddler period as well as preschool outcomes at age 5 years. Aim 1 will determine if adverse gestational environments resulting from maternal stress mediate socioeconomic disparities in child language and cognitive development. Aim 2 will deepen understanding into the placental characteristics of adverse gestational environments that are associated with lower language and cognitive development. Aim 3 will examine the combined contributions of AGEs and postnatal caregiving environments in predicting language and cognitive development. Across these aims, we utilize state-of-the-art methods from the social, behavioral, and biological sciences, and adopt a culturally and linguistically responsive approach to assessment of child language and cognitive development. This study will answer key questions about the origins of SES disparities in language and cognitive development that have important implications for theory, policy, and practice.