Living in a violent neighborhood affects children’s brain development

Study (PDF): Exposure to Community Violence as a Mechanism Linking Neighborhood Disadvantage to Amygdala Reactivity and the Protective Role of Parental Nurturance. Living in neighborhoods with high levels of violence can affect children's development by changing the way that a part of the brain detects and responds to potential threats, which could lead to poorer mental health and other negative outcomes. But these findings from a new University of Michigan study, published in Developmental Psychology, also indicate that nurturing parents can help protect kids against these detrimental effects. Decades of research have shown that growing up in neighborhoods with concentrated disadvantages can predict negative academic, behavioral and mental health outcomes in children and teens. Recent research is beginning to show that one way it does that is by impacting the developing brain, said study co-author Luke Hyde , U-M professor of psychology. "However, less is known about how neighborhood disadvantage 'gets under the skin' to impact brain development,- he said. Hyde and colleagues hypothesized that one way might be through the amygdala, the hub of the brain's stress response system that's involved in socioemotional functioning, threat processing and fear learning.