Why Your Childhood Follows You: The Science of Early Adversity and the Developing Brain

FYSEMR 43F Subject & Catalog Number

Description

We know from decades of research that the foundations of healthy development are built early in life. Genes lay the groundwork for the brain's architecture, but it is environmental input that modulates gene expression and shapes how neural circuitry develops. Experience “cuts both ways;” thus, the brain benefits from positive experiences but can be harmed by negative experiences. And timing matters: negative experiences during critical periods of brain development (generally the first years of life) are more impactful than those that occur after a critical period has closed. Our goal in this seminar is to understand how early life adversity can negatively impact developmental processes, including brain, biological and behavioral development, which ultimately may limit economic and social mobility.

In this seminar we will critically examine the range of adverse early experiences that impact children growing up in both low and high resource settings. We will consider both biological adversity (e.g., malnutrition, exposure to toxins) and psychological adversity (e.g., maltreatment, poverty). Key themes include a) the nature of the adversity to which children are exposed (e.g., physical abuse; intimate partner violence; food scarcity), b) the timing of the adversity (e.g., does it occur during the first 2 years of life or later in childhood?) c) the chronicity of the adversity (e.g., is exposure to adversity short-lived or does it continue for many months or years), and d) individual differences in response to adversity (e.g., two individuals, even identical twins, may respond differently to the same form of adversity). We will pay particular attention to the short‐ and long‐term outcomes on physical, neurological and psychological health.