Health & Medicine
Heavier Babies Hold Slight Academic Advantage
Kathleen Lees
First Posted: Dec 02, 2014 01:37 PM EST
As long as a baby weigh's within the normal range when he or she is born, it may not seem to make much of a difference. Yet researchers at Northwestern University have found that babies born at the heavier end of the spectrum may have a slight academic advantage than lighter ones.
"A child who is born healthy doesn't necessarily have a fully formed brain," said David Figlio, one of the study's authors and director of Northwestern's Institute for Policy Research (IPR), in a news release. "Our study speaks to the idea that longer gestation and accompanying weight gain is good," he said. "We want to know: What does that mean for public policy?"
Study results showed that babies who were heavier at birth typically had higher test scores from third through eighth grade-a relationship that was even more apparent among twin.
Furthermore, this was even true when attending a higher quality school to compensate for the disadvantage of lower birth weight and such factors as race, socioeconomic status, maternal education and a host of other factors.
"The results strongly point to the notion that the effects of poor neonatal health on adult outcomes are largely determined early -- in early childhood and the first years of elementary school," the researchers noted.
However, they concluded that birth weight by no means seals the deal when it comes educational growth.
"You'd rather be a low birth-weight baby with a mother who has a college degree, than a heavier baby, born to a high school dropout," they concluded.
More information regarding the findings can be seen here.
For more great science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).
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First Posted: Dec 02, 2014 01:37 PM EST
As long as a baby weigh's within the normal range when he or she is born, it may not seem to make much of a difference. Yet researchers at Northwestern University have found that babies born at the heavier end of the spectrum may have a slight academic advantage than lighter ones.
"A child who is born healthy doesn't necessarily have a fully formed brain," said David Figlio, one of the study's authors and director of Northwestern's Institute for Policy Research (IPR), in a news release. "Our study speaks to the idea that longer gestation and accompanying weight gain is good," he said. "We want to know: What does that mean for public policy?"
Study results showed that babies who were heavier at birth typically had higher test scores from third through eighth grade-a relationship that was even more apparent among twin.
Furthermore, this was even true when attending a higher quality school to compensate for the disadvantage of lower birth weight and such factors as race, socioeconomic status, maternal education and a host of other factors.
"The results strongly point to the notion that the effects of poor neonatal health on adult outcomes are largely determined early -- in early childhood and the first years of elementary school," the researchers noted.
However, they concluded that birth weight by no means seals the deal when it comes educational growth.
"You'd rather be a low birth-weight baby with a mother who has a college degree, than a heavier baby, born to a high school dropout," they concluded.
More information regarding the findings can be seen here.
For more great science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).
See Now: NASA's Juno Spacecraft's Rendezvous With Jupiter's Mammoth Cyclone