Scientists found that how warmly mothers played with their 3-year-olds was linked to a brain signal tied to depression risk, all the way to age 18
In 2004, researchers in New York invited hundreds of mothers and their 3-year-olds into a lab to read books and build with blocks while a camera rolled. Coders scored every session for warmth, encouragement and support, and for harshness and intrusiveness. Then the team kept coming back. Over the next 15 years they recorded the brain activity of 465 of those children at ages 9, 12, 15 and 18, focusing on one signal that earlier research has tied to depression. The question was whether a few lab games at age 3 could say anything about how positive parenting shows up in a teenager’s brain.
u/Spicy-Ramen-Noodles — 4 days ago