Tochukwu Nweze gives a video abstract of his paper ‘Working for the future: parentally deprived Nigerian Children have enhanced working memory ability’ first published in Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry (JCPP) 17 April 2020.
Read the Open Access paper doi.org/10.1111/jcpp.13241
Background
The dominant view based on the deficit model of developmental psychopathology is that early adverse rearing impairs cognition. In contrast, an emerging evolutionary–developmental model argues that individuals exposed to early‐life stress may have improved cognitive abilities that are adapted to harsh environments. We set out to test this hypothesis by examining cognitive functions in parentally deprived children in Nigeria.
Other authors; Mary Basil Nwoke, Juliet Ifeoma Nwufo, Richard Ikechukwu Aniekwu, Florian Lange
Tochukwu is a lecturer in the Department of Psychology, University of Nigeria, Nsukka and currently a first year PhD student in MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, University of Cambridge.
He obtained his B.SC in psychology from Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Nigeria. He subsequently went to Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London where he received his M.SC in Neuroimaging. He is currently doing his PhD with the Lifespan Cognitive Dynamics lab in MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit.
Tochukwu’s current research uses psychometric techniques to examine how psycho-socioeconomic adversities in early life affect brain and cognitive development. He utilizes longitudinal datasets to examine the contemporary and long-term consequences of adversity as well as cognitive adaptation in adverse-exposed individuals.
Twitter: @tochukwu_nweze
Transcript
[00:00:07.749] Tochukwu Nweze: Hi, my name is Tochukwu Nweze. I’m a Cognitive Psychologist and a Lecturer at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. I’m also a current PhD student in MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, University of Cambridge. So, today, I’m going to provide a brief summary of a recent paper my team in Nigeria and Belgium published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, titled “Working for the Future: Parentally Deprived Nigerian Children Have Enhanced Working Memory Ability.”
[00:00:41.117] The dominant view is that early life adversity generally impairs cognitive functions in all domains. This has led to the establishment of neurobiological pathways, through which early stressful life compromises brain and cognitive development. Intervention, according to this approach, is aimed at limiting the cognitive damage associated with early life adversity. However, an emerging evolutionary developmental approach, such as recent works by the Hidden Talent groups, have proved, to a relative success, the adaptive benefits associated with early adverse rearing. For example, being raised in an abusive or violent environment may enhance threat detection.
[00:01:28.947] Guided by the theoretical framework of deficit and adaptive models of developmental psychopathology, we conducted an exploratory study on the executive functioning of parentally deprived children in Nigeria. That is institutionalised and foster cared children. Depending on age of placement in institution and foster homes, these deprived children had an increased risk of having experienced extreme poverty, parental debt, severe neighbourhood stress and maternal malnutrition during pregnancy. Placement at these institutions are often motivated by these risk factors. Yet, some deprivation related stress, such as chronic uncertainty, neglect, and inconsistent caregiving, still persist.
[00:02:20.563] To assess for domain specific alterations in executive functioning, we employed a battery of executive function task, measuring such shifts in inhibition and working memory. Our results showed that non-deprived controlled children did not significantly perform better than deprived children in such shifting and inhibition measures. On the contrary, deprived children in our sample significantly performed better than non-deprived children in Digit Span task used for the assessment of working memory capacity, with effect sizes all greater than one. These results were consistent across through the robustness checks.
[00:03:03.486] Taken together, our findings support the Adaptation Model, which assumed that early life stress may not generally impair cognitive functions, but may even enhance it under some domains. Specifically, we interpret the enhanced working memory ability in a deprived group as a correlate of its ecological relevance.
[00:03:25.050] In Nigeria, underprivileged children have to rely, to a large extent, on their working memory ability to obtain success through academic hard work. Given relatively fewer government mechanism that promotes social mobility in Nigeria, parents and guardians constantly remind children from deprived background, but academic hard work present them with one escape route from poverty.
[00:03:51.174] It is likely that this message may have resonated with deprived children in our sample. In a subjective assessment, it is not uncommon to find children from poorer background perform academically better than their peers in all tiers of learning in Nigeria. In subsequent studies, we hope to corroborate this assumption, which could either strengthen or weaken our claims of enhanced working memory ability in deprived groups in Nigeria.
[00:04:22.318] Nonetheless, I’m keen to convince peers and practitioners in the field to routine approach to intervention following adversity, rather than the damage control approach that have advanced over the decades where enhanced performance in deprived groups are simply dismissed as compensatory. Emphasis should rather be placed on maximising the strength and talents of people in – from deprived background, with the expectation that such reinforcement could mask potential cognitive deficits.
[00:04:54.772] Before I end this video, I would like to give a shoutout to the very finest Editorial Team at JCPP for maintaining a very quick, transparent, and thorough review process. In the past, it would have been very difficult to publish a novel or contrary result like us. This is, therefore, a reminder to all Researchers to always come clean with their novel results, as many big journal outlets are more receptive of such submissions. It is only through such transparent reports can we know the true predictive outcomes following adversity.
[00:05:33.556] Thank you for watching this video.
Discussion
Interesting article! That early life stress may improve cognitive abilities for better adaptation has been a common sense belief among traditional Africans. And here’s the belief supported by research.
A Nice Article. Thank you.