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A study conducted in the US has revealed that children born during the Covid-19 pandemic period have significantly reduced abilities in speech, movement, and overall cognition compared to other children. Thus, the early years of a child's life are crucial for their cognitive development. However, the pandemic has led to significant changes in the lives of these children, affecting businesses, childcare facilities, schools, playgrounds, and their overall lifestyle. Additionally, many parents also feel increased stress as they struggle to balance work and childcare responsibilities.Sean Deoni, the lead author of the study and an associate professor of pediatrics at Brown University, stated that prolonged periods at home have limited stimulation and reduced interaction with the outside world, leading to children born during this period seemingly scoring significantly lower on tests designed to assess cognitive development.
During the decade before the pandemic, the average IQ score in standard tests for children aged 3 months to around 3 years typically hovered around 100. However, for children born during the pandemic, that number has dropped to only 78.The study involved 672 children from Rhode Island. Among them were 188 children born after July 2020, 308 children born before January 2019, and 176 children born from January 2019 to March 2020. It is known that the children studied were all born full-term, without disabilities, and mainly Caucasian. Additionally, researchers also found that children from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds tended to have lower outcomes. According to Deoni, the primary reason behind the decline in scores is due to the lack of stimulation and interaction at home. 'Parents are stressed and worried, so the interactive exchanges that children should ideally receive are significantly reduced.',
However, it is still unclear whether such low cognitive scores have long-term effects on children or not. But in the first few years of life, a child's cognitive foundation is like building a foundation for a house, adding additional floors or rooms will be easier when the foundation is strong. 'The opportunities for rectification and correction will become smaller as the child grows older.' Furthermore, since the data mainly comes from relatively affluent areas of the United States, where social support and unemployment benefits are abundant, the study authors are concerned that the results may be even worse in more disadvantaged regions of the country and around the world.Terence Stephenson, a professor of child health at University College London, remarked that this study is very intriguing because there have been numerous studies on the impact of Covid-19 on school-age children, but there is still very little data on the impact of the pandemic on younger children. He also believes that the main factor influencing IQ scores in infants lies in the stress of parents, who face significant challenges in both work and full-time childcare. 'It's perhaps not surprising that children from low-income families are most affected because this is compounded by many factors such as finances, employment, pandemic health, and mental well-being.',According to The Guardian
