ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2017
Decline in the negative association between low birth weight and cognitive ability.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 16 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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16 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 43 citations in OpenAlex.
- Birth outcomes following intrauterine exposure to electronic nicotine delivery systems: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Nicotine & tobacco research : official journal of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco · 2026Pooled it
- Mendelian randomization suggests that head circumference, but not birth weight and length, associates with intelligence.Brain and behavior · 2021Pooled it
- The relationship between prenatal heat exposure and birth outcomes: How much does the heat metric matter?PloS one · 2025Article
- Educational gradients in the prevalence of medically assisted reproduction births in a comparative perspective.Fertility and sterility · 2024Article
- Article
- Developmental delay and its associated factors among children under five years in urban slums of Nepal.PloS one · 2022Article
- Patterns of Fetal and Infant Growth and Brain Morphology at Age 10 Years.JAMA network open · 2021Article
- The cognitive development from childhood to adolescence of low birthweight children born after medically assisted reproduction-a UK longitudinal cohort study.International journal of epidemiology · 2021Article
- Divergent Trends in the Effects of Early-Life Factors on Adult Health.Population research and policy review · 2021Article
- Changes in emotional problems, hyperactivity and conduct problems in moderate to late preterm children and adolescents born between 1958 and 2002 in the United Kingdom.JCPP advances · 2021Article
- Factors associated with birthweight and adverse pregnancy outcomes among children in rural Guinea-Bissau - a prospective observational study.BMC public health · 2021Observational
- The Rise in Single-Mother Families and Children's Cognitive Development: Evidence From Three British Birth Cohorts.Child development · 2020Article
- Size at birth and cognitive function among rural adolescents: a life course epidemiology study protocol of the Kisalaya cohort in Mysuru, South India.BMJ paediatrics open · 2020Article
- Association between exposure to particulate matter during pregnancy and birthweight: a systematic review and a meta-analysis of birth cohort studies.Journal of biomedical research · 2017Article
- Fundamental Frequency Variation of Neonatal Spontaneous Crying Predicts Language Acquisition in Preterm and Term Infants.Frontiers in psychology · 2017Article
- Prediction of Cognitive Ability With Social Determinants in Children of Low Birth Weight.Nursing researchArticle
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Low birth weight predicts compromised cognitive ability. We used data from the 1958 National Child Development Study (NCDS), the 1970 British Cohort Study (BCS), and the 2000-2002 Millennium Cohort Study (MCS) to analyze how this association has changed over time. Birth weight was divided into two categories, <2,500 g (low) and 2,500-4,500 g (normal) and verbal cognitive ability was measured at the age of 10 or 11 y. A range of maternal and family characteristics collected at or soon after the time of birth were considered. Linear regression was used to analyze the association between birth weight and cognitive ability in a baseline model and in a model that adjusted for family characteristics. The standardized difference (SD) in cognitive scores between low-birth-weight and normal-birth-weight children was large in the NCDS [-0.37 SD, 95% confidence interval (CI): -0.46, -0.27] and in the BCS (-0.34, 95% CI: -0.43, -0.25) cohorts, and it was more than halved for children born in the MCS cohort (-0.14, 95% CI: -0.22, -0.06). The adjustment for family characteristics did not explain the cross-cohort differences. The results show that the association between low birth weight and decreased cognitive ability has declined between the 1950s and 1970s birth cohorts and the 2000--2002 birth cohort, despite a higher proportion of the low-birth-weight babies having a very low birth weight (<1,500 g) in the more recent birth cohort. Advancements in obstetric and neonatal care may have attenuated the negative consequences associated with being born small.
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