Subjective Socioeconomic Status and Children's Amygdala Volume: Minorities' Diminish Returns.

Shervin Assari,Shanika Boyce,Mohsen Bazargan

doi:10.3390/neurosci1020006

Abstract

Considerable research has suggested that low socioeconomic status (SES) negatively influences brain structure, including but not limited to decreased amygdala volume. Considering race and ethnicity as sociological rather than biological constructs, this study was built on minorities' diminished returns (MDRs) to test if the effects of family SES on the total amygdala volume is weaker for black and Latino children than white and non-Latino children. We borrowed data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study, a national multi-center brain imaging investigation of childhood brain development in the US. The total sample was 9380 9-10-year-old children. The independent variables were subjective family SES and parental education. The primary outcome was total amygdala volume. High subjective SES and parental education were independently associated with larger total amygdala size. The association between high subjective SES and larger total amygdala volume was less pronounced for black and Latino children than white and non-Latino children. For American children, family SES has unequal effects on amygdala size and function, a pattern that is consistent with MDRs. This result suggests that SES loses some of its expected effects for racial and ethnic minority families.

Highlights

High socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with positive childhood emotions and behaviors [1].For example, children from higher SES families are protected against school drop-out [2], depression [3], suicide [4,5], antisocial behaviors [6], aggression [7], and use of tobacco [8,9], alcohol [10,11], and drugs [12]
We focused on the amygdala, which is highly involved in emotion regulation, emotion expression, social relations, aggression, and impulsivity
Race and ethnicity alter the implications of family SES for amygdala structure and function, which are at the core of and salient to brain functions across domains

Summary

Introduction

Children from higher SES families are protected against school drop-out [2], depression [3], suicide [4,5], antisocial behaviors [6], aggression [7], and use of tobacco [8,9], alcohol [10,11], and drugs [12] These behavioral effects of SES are mainly attributed to the protective effects of high SES on childhood development. The scarcity hypothesis provides an explanation for why low SES deteriorates healthy children’s brain development According to this hypothesis, low SES is a proxy of early adversity, stress, economic insecurity, and lack of resources, all operating as risk factors for poor child development. As a result of NeuroSci 2020, 1, 59–74; doi:10.3390/neurosci1020006 www.mdpi.com/journal/neurosci

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Discussion

Conclusion