Wealth changes how kids’ brains look, Harvard study says

Living in an unequal society, the poor bear the heaviest brunt. Not only do they struggle to acquire the crumbs of what the rich earn, but this income disparity has led many, particularly kids, to have an atypical brain development.

According to researchers at Harvard University, King’s College London, and the University of York, a magnified economic gap has caused numerous children nowadays to be afflicted with mental disorders, with some having a different structure in various brain regions.

The study found that this inequality caused some kids to have thinner cortex (the brain’s outer layer) and altered brain networks compared to their peers living in lower economic gaps. These might tamper with the children’s ability to think clearly, remember things, regulate emotions, and worse, have depressive symptoms.

In fact, researchers from New York State Psychiatric Institute highlighted that cortex thinning is associated with a heightened risk of developing depression. 

“While numerous studies have examined links between individual dimensions of social economic status (e.g., family income or parent education), ours is an important contribution, as it links a structural characteristic of a society to children’s brain structure and function,” emphasized Divyangana Rakesh, first author of the recent paper and lecturer at King’s College London.

Based on the study, over 8,000 9–10-year-old children living across 17 U.S. states were analyzed through datasets from Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study (ABCD) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans—showing brain thickness, surface area, and structure.

Along with these, the researchers weighed the influence on the children’s brain development by socio-economic factors such as their family’s income, education, health care access, and prevalence of imprisonment in their local community. Also, their mental health was monitored for 18 months after the MRI scans.

Through these, they highlighted that uneven wealth distribution is one of the biggest alterations in brain development. Those in the lower economic bracket are particularly vulnerable to mental health disorders as they were already exposed to stressful environments at such a young age—constantly worrying whether there would be food at the table or their bills would be paid.

These are also some of the factors why in the Philippines, marginalized youth are in a worse mental state. According to a study by Cambridge University Press, the percentage of Filipino youth experiencing depression has more than doubled in just eight years. This highlights how economic inequality has possibly contributed greatly to a hike of depressed teens.

“Our findings highlight that structural inequality, over and above family income, is associated with children’s brains,” Rakesh explained.

Rakesh added that the results would prove useful in linking income inequality to longitudinal brain development, thereby monitoring the brain changes from childhood to adulthood.

Indeed, this study may prompt interventions in creating an equitable and a mentally healthy community—one where everyone gets a fair shot in life, not just the lucky few.