Breastfeeding promoted brain development in the infants of disadvantaged mothers, according to a study of nearly 6,000 children.
As a direct result, children of low-income mothers who breastfeed perform significantly better on tasks involving speaking, drawing, and comprehension, according to a British study.
Those who were breastfed for at least three months perform 8 percent better on cognitive tests up to the age of seven than those who were bottle-fed, according to research.
Breastfeeding promotes brain development in the offspring of disadvantaged mothers to the extent that they are better prepared for a primary school than children raised on formula milk.
The findings provide substantial new evidence that breastfeeding is beneficial for infants. However, while previous studies have primarily linked early breast milk consumption to physical health, this new paper – based on an analysis of data from nearly 6,000 British children – is one of the first to demonstrate that it also improves their cognitive abilities.
The study also revealed that women with a low level of education who gave birth on the weekend were less likely to breastfeed their children due to a lack of hospital staff to assist them in establishing the practice.
Prof. Emla Fitzsimons of University College London’s Centre for Longitudinal Studies and Prof. Marcos Vera-Hernández of its economics department conducted the research. They analyzed data from a nationally representative sample of nearly 6,000 British children born in the United Kingdom during 2000-2002 who are participating in the Millennium Cohort Study and whose mothers dropped out of school before turning 17 and who had a natural or low-risk birth.
Fitzsimons stated that the cognitive development findings were “statistically significant.”
At the age of three, breastfed children scored on average 9.88 points higher than non-breastfed children on the “expressive language” test, in which they are shown pictures of objects and asked to name them. The average score for all children was 70.4 points.
In addition, breastfed three-year-olds scored 8.3 points higher on average for “school readiness” – mastery of fundamental literacy and numeracy skills – than the age-group average of 22.2.
The same differences were observed when children were retested at the age of five, as well as in an evaluation of their visuospatial skill (their ability to replicate a design using patterned squares) and “pictorial reasoning” (their ability to analyze images).
The study, which was published in the American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, states, “Our findings, which pertain to mothers with relatively low levels of education, are striking. We find strong effects of breastfeeding on children’s cognitive development, inconclusive effects on noncognitive skills, and no evidence of health effects during this period of childhood.
Wealthier women are significantly more likely to breastfeed than less fortunate women. The 2010 UK-wide Infant Feeding Survey, which contains the most recent data on the subject, found that only 30 percent of women who left full-time education between the ages of 17 and 18 breastfed their child for at least four months, compared to 56 percent of those who left after the age of 18.
The Royal College of Midwives urged the NHS to enhance breastfeeding support.
Clare Livingstone, its professional policy adviser and lead on infant feeding, stated, “There is substantial and growing evidence of the health benefits of breastfeeding to the mother and baby, as well as on the baby’s cognitive development.”
“Therefore, it is essential that maternity services are always adequately staffed so that midwives and maternity support workers can provide every mother with high-quality assistance with infant feeding. The current and worsening midwife shortage in England, as well as growing staffing issues in other UK nations, make it extremely difficult to achieve this goal.
“Not everyone is capable of or chooses to breastfeed, and socioeconomic and educational factors also play a role. It is a complicated situation, but access to breastfeeding support for mothers is crucial.”
