ArticleJournal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines2015
Birth weight as an independent predictor of ADHD symptoms: a within-twin pair analysis.
Article in Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 52 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
52 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 112 citations in OpenAlex.
- Early environmental risk factors for neurodevelopmental disorders - a systematic review of twin and sibling studies.Development and psychopathology · 2021Pooled it
- A Meta-Analysis of the Association Between Birth Weight and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.Journal of abnormal child psychology · 2018Pooled it
- Clinical characteristics of pediatric attention deficit hyperactivity disorder patients born with low birth weight, small for gestational age, or preterm.Fukushima journal of medical science · 2026Article
- Association between infant feeding and ADHD development in childhood: a birth cohort study in Taiwan.Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines · 2025Article
- The longitudinal effects of neonatal anthropometry on attention problems in males and females.JCPP advances · 2025Article
- Birth weight and ponderal index percentiles for twins based on sex and chorionicity in a center of Guangdong Province, China.Translational pediatrics · 2024Article
- The Association Between In Utero Exposure to Painkillers and Trajectories of Hyperactivity and Emotional Problems in Children with Autism Compared with Neurotypical Peers.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Maternal asthma and asthma exacerbation during pregnancy and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in offspring: a population-based cohort study.European child & adolescent psychiatry · 2024Article
- Within- and between-twin comparisons of risk for childhood behavioral difficulties after preterm birth.Pediatric research · 2024Article
- The persistent effects of foetal growth on child and adolescent mental health: longitudinal evidence from a large population-based cohort.European child & adolescent psychiatry · 2023Article
- Evaluation of Birth Weight and Neurodevelopmental Conditions Among Monozygotic and Dizygotic Twins.JAMA network open · 2023Article
- Article
- Explaining the Association Between Fetal Growth and Childhood ADHD Symptoms: Cross-cohort Replication.Research on child and adolescent psychopathology · 2023Article
- Gestational Age at Term and Teacher-Reported Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder Symptom Patterns.The Journal of pediatrics · 2022Article
- Associations of preterm birth, small-for-gestational age, preeclampsia and placental abruption with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in the offspring: Nationwide cohort and sibling-controlled studies.Acta paediatrica (Oslo, Norway : 1992) · 2022Article
- Alcohol consumption at age 18-25 and number of children at a 33-year follow-up: Individual and within-pair analyses of Finnish twins.Alcoholism, clinical and experimental research · 2022Article
- Birth Weight and Childhood Psychopathology in the ABCD Cohort: Association is Strongest for Attention Problems and is Moderated by Sex.Research on child and adolescent psychopathology · 2022Article
- Nonshared environmental factors in the aetiology of autism and other neurodevelopmental conditions: a monozygotic co-twin control study.Molecular autism · 2022Article
- Periconceptional Folic Acid Supplementation and Newborn Birth Weights.Frontiers in pediatrics · 2022Article
- Perinatal Acetaminophen Exposure and Childhood Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD): Exploring the Role of Umbilical Cord Plasma Metabolites in Oxidative Stress Pathways.Brain sciences · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 4 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
backgroundStudies have found an association between low birth weight and ADHD, but the nature of this relation is unclear. First, it is uncertain whether birth weight is associated with both of the ADHD dimensions, inattentiveness and hyperactivity-impulsivity. Second, it remains uncertain whether the association between birth weight and ADHD symptom severity is confounded by familial factors.
methodParents of all Swedish 9- and 12-year-old twins born between 1992 and 2000 were interviewed for DSM-IV inattentive and hyperactive-impulsive ADHD symptoms by the Autism - Tics, AD/HD and other Comorbidities (A-TAC) inventory (N = 21,775 twins). Birth weight was collected prospectively through the Medical Birth Registry. We used a within-twin pair design to control for genetic and shared environmental factors.
resultsReduced birth weight was significantly associated with a mean increase in total ADHD (β = -.42; 95% CI: -.53, -.30), inattentive (β = -.26; 95% CI: -.33, -.19), and hyperactive-impulsive (β = -.16; 95% CI: -.22, -.10) symptom severity. These results imply that a change of one kilogram of birth weight corresponded to parents rating their child nearly one unit higher (going from "no" to "yes, to some extent" on a given symptom) on the total ADHD scale. These associations remained within pairs of MZ and DZ twins, and were also present when restricting the analyses to full term births.
conclusionsThere is an independent association between low birth weight and all forms of ADHD symptoms, even after controlling for all environmental and genetic confounds shared within twin pairs. These results indicate that fetal growth restriction (as reflected in birth weight differences within twin pairs) and/or the environmental factors which influence it is in the casual pathway leading to ADHD.
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