Abstract
ABSTRACT Purpose: to determine whether undernutrition in the first years of life affects the phonological awareness skills, the phonological working memory and the school performance of children. Methods: the participants were children with a history of moderate/severe undernutrition during their first years of life (G1) who achieved nutritional recovery (n = 15). The performance of G1 in different cognitive tasks (phonological awareness at the syllable and phoneme level, phonological working memory - repetition of digits and pseudowords, and reading, writing and arithmetic activities) was compared to that of children with school difficulties (G2) (n = 15) and without school difficulties (G3) (n = 15), all eutrophic ones. Results: the performance of G1 was worse than that of the other two groups in all tasks evaluated (mean score of G1, G2 and G3 and p-values: phonological awareness: 31, 41, 57 - 0.01; repetition of direct order digits: 18, 23, 28 - 0.001; writing: 4, 10, 22 - 0.001; reading: 26, 45, 65-0.001; arithmetic: 4, 7, 11- 0.001). Conclusion: the results demonstrate that undernutrition affected the cognitive development, causing changes in important cognitive skills for the development of written language.
Highlights
Childhood development consists in an ordered progression of skills originating from the interaction between environmental factors and genetic potential[1]
Several studies have pointed out that undernutrition, when present during critical growth and brain development periods, severely affects cognition since the brain does not receive the nutrients necessary for its development
Myelinization, neurogenesis and neuronal migration occur during this period[15] so that nutritional insults during this period represent a high risk factor for the development of the cognitive skills that are essential for written language
Summary
Childhood development consists in an ordered progression of skills (motor, cognitive and personal/ social) originating from the interaction between environmental factors and genetic potential[1]. Among them nutritional deficiencies (growth and micronutrient deficits) and the lack of learning opportunities prevent children from achieving their potential for development[1,2]. The adverse effects of macro- and micronutrient deficiency during childhood may not be fully reversible even after nutritional rehabilitation and continue to affect the various cognitive functions during school years and the quality of life during adulthood[3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14]. Myelinization, neurogenesis and neuronal migration occur during this period[15] so that nutritional insults during this period represent a high risk factor for the development of the cognitive skills that are essential for written language
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