Editorial: Embracing Complexity When Examining the Social Construct of Race: Nuanced Strategies Are Needed to Reduce...

Although advances in neurodevelopmental sciences and clinical care have progressed at lightning speed, our headway in addressing the long history of racism in science and medicine has been notably slower and muddled. Only recently has there been widespread acknowledgement in the scientific community that race is a social construct¹-with greater genetic variability among categorical groups than within-spurring contemporary guidance from the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM)² confirming that "race" is not biologically based and that analyses suggesting otherwise are "misleading and harmful." Others have illuminated the problematic use of race-based diagnostic algorithms and practice guidelines, given their contributions to health inequities.³ Race/ethnicity has historically been treated as a confounding or stratification variable in health research, but leaders have argued for revamping this approach^4,5 to avoid the implication that biological differences underlie observed inequities. Given the pervasiveness of racial/ethnic inequities in neurodevelopmental outcomes and policies and social structures that have led to substantial correlations between poverty and race, the complexity of studying socioeconomic effects precludes one-size-fits-all approaches-particularly in the current sociopolitical climate.