Abstract
Objectives There is an enduring negative association between low birth weight (<2500 g) and early childhood cognitive skills. This study examines if parenting practices meaningfully contribute to or offset birth weight disparities in cognitive development prior to formal schooling. Methods This study uses the ECLS-B, a nationally representative sample of live births in the United States in 2001. Unlike studies focused on one or two measures of parenting and investment, this study considers a wide array parenting measures collected at multiple time points, tracked from before birth across 5 years of development. Results Regression results show that nearly 50 % of the low-birth-weight gap in early math and reading ability is associated with family socioeconomic status. Between-family OLS regressions show that parenting practices, including “parental interaction,” “cognitive stimulation,” and “parent quality”, are negatively associated with low birth weight and positively associated with improved cognitive skill among all children. After adjustment for family socioeconomic status, parenting practices did little to offset (by mediation or moderation) remaining birth weight disparities in early cognitive development. Conclusions Effective parenting is positively associated with cognitive development, but parenting is not a panacea—the developmental disadvantages associated with poor child health are not linked to parenting practices. We argue that birth weight disparities are rooted in biology and cannot easily be offset by parenting practices.
Similar content being viewed by others
Abbreviations
- NBW:
-
Normal birth weight
- LBW:
-
Low birth weight
- VLBW:
-
Very low birth weight
- ECLS-B:
-
Early Childhood Longitudinal Study (9 months to kindergarten)
- NCES:
-
National Center for Education Statistics
- OLS:
-
Ordinary least squares
- NCATS:
-
Nursing Child Assessment Teaching Scale
- CES-D:
-
Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale
References
Almond, D., & Currie, J. (2011). Killing me softly: The fetal origins hypothesis. The Journal of Economic Perspectives: A Journal of the American Economic Association, 25(3), 153.
Blau, P. M., & Duncan, O. D. (1967). The occupational structure. New York, NY: Wiley.
Boardman, J. D., Powers, D. A., Padilla, Y. C., & Hummer, R. A. (2002). Low birth weight, social factors, and developmental outcomes among children in the United States. Demography, 39(2), 353–368.
Case, A., Fertig, A., & Paxson, C. (2005). The lasting impact of childhood health and circumstance. Journal of Health Economics, 24(2), 365–389. doi:10.1016/j.jhealeco.2004.09.008.
Child Trends Databank. (2015). Low and very low birthweight infants. Retrieved from http://www.childtrends.org/?indicators=low-and-very-low-birthweight-infants.
Conley, D., Strully, K., & Bennett, N. G. (2003). The starting gate: Birth weight and life chances. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.
Currie, J. (2011). Inequality at birth: Some causes and consequences. National Bureau of Economic Research, 101(3), 1–22. doi:10.3386/w16798.
Currie, J., & Hyson, R. (1999). Is the impact of health shocks cushioned by socioeconomic status? The case of low birthweight. National Bureau of Economic Research, 89(2), 245–250. doi:10.3386/w6999.
Datar, A., Kilburn, M. R., & Loughran, D. S. (2010). Endowments and parental investments in infancy and early childhood. Demography, 47(1), 145–162.
de Bernabé, J. V., Soriano, T., Albaladejo, R., Juarranz, M., Calle, M. E., Martínez, D., et al. (2004). Risk factors for low birth weight: A review. European Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology and Reproductive Biology, 116(1), 3–15.
Duncan, G. J., Dowsett, C. J., Claessens, A., Magnuson, K., Huston, A. C., Klebanov, P., et al. (2007). School readiness and later achievement. Developmental Psychology, 43(6), 1428–1446.
Duncan, G. J., & Magnuson, K. (2011). The nature and impact of early achievement skills, attention skills, and behavior problems. In G. J. Duncan, & R. J. Murnane (Eds.), Whither opportunity? Rising inequality, schools, and children’s life chances (pp. 47–69). New York City: Russell Sage Foundation.
Elman, C., Wray, L. A., & Xi, J. (2014). Fundamental resource dis/advantages, youth health and adult educational outcomes. Social Science Research, 43, 108–126.
Geronimus, A. T. (1996). Black/white differences in the relationship of maternal age to birthweight: A population-based test of the weathering hypothesis. Social Science & Medicine, 42(4), 589–597. doi:10.1016/0277-9536(95)00159-X.
Goosby, B. J., & Cheadle, J. E. (2009). Birth weight, math and reading achievement growth: A multilevel between-sibling, between-families approach. Social Forces, 87(3), 1291–1320.
Gorman, B. K. (1999). Racial and ethnic variation in low birthweight in the United States: individual and contextual determinants. Health & Place, 5(3), 195–207.
Gorman, B. K. (2002). Birth weight and cognitive development in adolescence: Causal relationship or social selection? Biodemography and Social Biology, 49(1), 13–34.
Hack, M., Klein, N. K., & Taylor, H. G. (1995). Long-term developmental outcomes of low birth weight infants. The Future of Children, 5(1), 176–196.
Hamilton, B., Martin, J., Osterman, M., Curtin, S., & Mathews, M. S. (2015). Births: Final data for 2014. National Vital Statistics Reports, 64(12), 1–64.
Heckman, J. J. (2008). Schools, skills, and synapses. Economic Inquiry, 46(3), 289–324.
Kline, R. B. (2015). Principles and practice of structural equation modeling. New York: Guilford Publications.
Lynch, J. L., & Brooks, R. (2013). Low birth weight and parental investment: Do parents favor the fittest child? Journal of Marriage and Family, 75(3), 533–543. doi:10.1111/jomf.12028.
McGovern, M. E. (2013). Still unequal at birth: Birth weight, socio-economic status and outcomes at age 9. The Economic and Social Review, 44(1, Spring), 53–84.
Merry, J. J. (2013). Tracing the US deficit in PISA reading skills to early childhood evidence from the United States and Canada. Sociology of Education, 86(3), 234–252.
Morenoff, J. D. (2003). Neighborhood mechanisms and the spatial dynamics of birth weight. American Journal of Sociology, 108(5), 976–1017.
Najarian, M., Snow, K., Lennon, J., Kinsey, S., & Mulligan, G. (2010). Early childhood longitudinal study, birth cohort (ECLS-B). Preschool-Kindergarten 2007 Psychometric Report, 2010–009.
Nord, C., Edwards, B., Hilpert, R., Branden, L., Andreassen, C., Elmore, A., et al. (2005). User’s manual for ECLS-B nine-month public-use data file and electronic code book. National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), 13.
Palloni, A. (2006). Reproducing inequalities: Luck, wallets, and the enduring effects of childhood health. Demography, 43(4), 587–615.
Royer, H. (2009). Separated at girth: US twin estimates of the effects of birth weight. American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 1(1), 49–85.
Shenkin, S. D., Starr, J. M., & Deary, I. J. (2004). Birth weight and cognitive ability in childhood: A systematic review. Psychological Bulletin, 130(6), 989.
Sparks, P. J. (2009). Do biological, sociodemographic, and behavioral characteristics explain racial/ethnic disparities in preterm births? Social Science and Medicine, 68(9), 1667–1675.
StataCorp, L. (2013). Stata Statistical Software: Release 13. College Station, TX: Stata-Corp LP.
Summer, G., & Spietz, A. (1994). Caregiver/parent–child interaction teaching manual. Seattle, WA: NCAST Publications.
Tully, L. A., Arseneault, L., Caspi, A., Moffitt, T. E., & Morgan, J. (2004). Does maternal warmth moderate the effects of birth weight on twins’ attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms and low IQ? Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 72(2), 218.
Ventura, S. J., Hamilton, B. E., Mathews, T., & Chandra, A. (2003). Trends and variations in smoking during pregnancy and low birth weight: evidence from the birth certificate, 1990–2000. Pediatrics, 111(Supplement 1), 1176–1180.
Author’s Contribution
Dr. Lynch initiated the study, developed the first draft of the paper, revised drafts and approved the final manuscript as submitted. Dr. Gibbs developed the literature, added subsequent variables and analyses using statistical techniques, drafted the final manuscript version and approved the final manuscript as submitted.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
None.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Lynch, J.L., Gibbs, B.G. Birth Weight and Early Cognitive Skills: Can Parenting Offset the Link?. Matern Child Health J 21, 156–167 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10995-016-2104-z
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10995-016-2104-z