Malnutrition during childhood results in antisocial, aggressive behavior later in life

Although there are other factors that lead to antisocial behavior, malnutrition, which leads to a low IQ, is a missing link. The United States may learn something from this study, since toddlers, adolescents and females suffer from iron deficiency.

• "There's more to antisocial behavior than nutrition, but we argue that it is an important missing link," said Adrian Raine, a coauthor of the study.
• Malnutrition in the first few years of life leads to antisocial and aggressive behavior throughout childhood and late adolescence, according to a new USC study.
• "These are the first findings to show that malnutrition in the early postnatal years is associated with behavior problems through age 17," said Jianghong Liu, a postdoctoral fellow with USC's Social Science Research Institute and the lead author of the study published in the American Journal of Psychiatry's November issue.
• For 14 years, researchers followed the nutritional, behavioral and cognitive development of more than 1,000 children who lived on Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Africa.
• The children's intelligence level and cognitive ability were also tested, and social workers visited their homes to come up with a so-called adversity score that summarized factors such as the income, occupation, health, age and education levels of their parents and their overall living conditions.
• At age 11, the feedback came from parents who told researchers about whether their children lied, cheated, got into fights, bullied others, destroyed property or used obscene language.
• At age 17, both parents and teachers reported on antisocial behavior such as stealing, drug use, destroying property or being deliberately cruel to others.
• Over time, a link became evident between malnourishment and antisocial or aggressive behavior, said Adrian Raine, a coauthor of the study and holder of the Robert Grandford Wright Professorship in Psychology in USC's College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.
• The findings have implications for the United States, Raine said, where 7 percent of toddlers suffer from iron deficiency, a number that jumps to between 9 percent and 16 percent in adolescent and female groups.