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Associations between children's socioeconomic status and prefrontal cortical thickness

Gwendolyn M Lawson1, Jeffrey T Duda, Brian B Avants

  • 1Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, USA.

Developmental Science
|September 17, 2013
PubMed

Insights

Childhood socioeconomic status (SES) is linked to brain structure. Higher parental education correlated with greater cortical thickness in key frontal brain regions in children.

Area of Science:

  • Neuroscience
  • Developmental Psychology
  • Neuroimaging

Background:

  • Childhood socioeconomic status (SES) influences cognitive development and executive function.
  • The anatomical basis linking SES to prefrontal cortex function in children remains largely unexplored.
  • Previous research highlights SES effects on cognitive performance but lacks detailed structural brain correlates.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the relationship between childhood socioeconomic status (SES) and prefrontal cortical thickness in healthy children.
  • To identify specific prefrontal cortical regions associated with SES measures like family income and parental education.
  • To explore the potential of brain structure as a mediator between SES and cognitive function.

Main Methods:

  • Utilized structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data from 283 healthy children.
  • Analyzed demographic data, focusing on family income and parental education as key SES indicators.
  • Assessed gray matter thickness in prefrontal cortical subregions and their asymmetry, controlling for confounding variables.

Main Results:

  • Parental education significantly predicted cortical thickness in the right anterior cingulate gyrus.
  • Parental education also significantly predicted cortical thickness in the left superior frontal gyrus.
  • No significant association was found between family income and prefrontal cortical thickness after adjustments.

Conclusions:

  • Childhood parental education is associated with specific anatomical differences in prefrontal cortical thickness.
  • These findings suggest that brain structure in frontal regions may mediate the link between SES and cognitive abilities in typically developing children.
  • Structural MRI provides insights into the neurobiological pathways influenced by socioeconomic factors during development.

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