ArticleBrain, behavior, and immunity2023
The gut microbiome and child mental health: A population-based study.
Article in Brain, behavior, and immunity, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 22 citations in OpenAlex.
- Gut microbiota and western dietary patterns associated with behavioral problems in children and adolescents: a cross-sectional study.Nutrition journal · 2026Article
- Family Anthropometric and Physiological Correlations With Parent- and Teacher-Rated Preschooler Socio-Behavioral Health.Journal of child and adolescent psychiatric nursing : official publication of the Association of Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Nurses, Inc · 2026Article
- The relationship between the gut microbiota and neuropsychological development and behaviour during childhood and adolescence: a systematic review of epidemiological studies.Brain, behavior, & immunity - health · 2026Review
- The Gut Microbiome and Its Impact on Mood and Decision-Making: A Mechanistic and Therapeutic Review.Nutrients · 2025Review
- Dynamic human gut microbiome and immune shifts during an immersive psychosocial intervention program.Brain, behavior, and immunity · 2025Observational
- Early-life gut microbiome development and its potential long-term impact on health outcomes.Microbiome research reports · 2025Review
- The saNeuroGut Initiative: Investigating the Gut Microbiome and Symptoms of Anxiety, Depression, and Posttraumatic Stress.Neuroimmunomodulation · 2025Article
- The gut microbiome and child and adolescent depression and anxiety: a systematic review and meta-analysis with youth consultation.Gut microbiome (Cambridge, England) · 2025Review
- Dynamic Human Gut Microbiome and Immune Shifts During an Immersive Psychosocial Therapeutic Program.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2024Article
- Article
- The Potential Impact of the Gut Microbiota on Neonatal Brain Development and Adverse Health Outcomes.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Review
- Gut microbial diversity moderates polygenic risk of schizophrenia.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Article
- Methodological recommendations for human microbiota-gut-brain axis research.Microbiome research reports · 2024Review
- Molecular signalling during cross talk between gut brain axis regulation and progression of irritable bowel syndrome: A comprehensive review.World journal of clinical cases · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
14 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
Abstract
The link between the gut microbiome and the brain has gained increasing scientific and public interest for its potential to explain psychiatric risk. While differences in gut microbiome composition have been associated with several mental health problems, evidence to date has been largely based on animal models and human studies with modest sample sizes. In this cross-sectional study in 1,784 ten-year-old children from the multi-ethnic, population-based Generation R Study, we aimed to characterize associations of the gut microbiome with child mental health problems. Gut microbiome was assessed from stool samples using 16S rRNA sequencing. We focused on overall psychiatric symptoms as well as with specific domains of emotional and behavioral problems, assessed via the maternally rated Child Behavior Checklist. While we observed lower gut microbiome diversity in relation to higher overall and specific mental health problems, associations were not significant. Likewise, we did not identify any taxonomic feature associated with mental health problems after multiple testing correction, although suggestive findings indicated depletion of genera previously associated with psychiatric disorders, including Hungatella, Anaerotruncus and Oscillospiraceae. The identified compositional abundance differences were found to be similar across all mental health problems. Finally, we did not find significant enrichment for specific microbial functions in relation to mental health problems. In conclusion, based on the largest sample examined to date, we do not find clear evidence of associations between gut microbiome diversity, taxonomies or functions and mental health problems in the general pediatric population. In future, the use of longitudinal designs with repeated measurements of microbiome and psychiatric outcomes will be critical to identify whether and when associations between the gut microbiome and mental health emerge across development and into adulthood.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.