New study shows how diet, water intake and beverages affects children's brain

A new study has found how diet, water intake and beverages like coffee affect a child’s brain. According to the findings of the study, children who reported higher consumption of snacks and sugar-sweetened beverages scored lower on standardized academic tests, than children who consumed less of these foods. However, unhealthy diets were not linked to lower cognitive test scores in children.

Increase in water intake leads to better memory

The study suggested that children with greater habitual hydration performed better during tasks requiring cognitive flexibility. In addition, children showed improvements in their hydration levels and working memory after consuming a higher amount of water - 2.5 litres daily- than when instructed to drink just half a litre per day.

Better nutrition in the early stage leads to better child development

Under-nutrition, prevalent among young children worldwide can harm children’s development. In a randomized controlled trail conducted in 26 Indian villages, infants who received a multiple micro nutrient powder, an early learning intervention, or both, showed significant improvements in expressive language, visual reception, and social-emotional behavior compared with those receiving a placebo.

Effects of caffeine

Researchers also studied the effects of Caffeine and L-theanine, substances found in tea leaves, in children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), They found five boys with ADHD showed better-sustained attention, improved cognitive performance and decreased impulsivity when taking caffeine and L-theanine supplements together compared to a placebo.

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OCD linked to educational underachievement

People with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), especially those diagnosed before age 18, are less likely to pass compulsory school tests or to go on to higher education compared with peers who don’t have the disorder, a large European study finds.

Less schooling can translate into fewer job opportunities and lower pay over a lifetime, but early OCD diagnosis and interventions might help to close this gap, researchers conclude.

OCD is estimated to affect approximately some million around the world. Symptoms of the condition include obsessive thoughts and fears, and compulsions to repeatedly perform tasks to allay those fears.

“OCD often starts in childhood/adolescence and can be chronic,” said lead author.

“Sufferers typically experience highly distressing thoughts and feel compelled to perform rituals (compulsions) for several hours a day. This can have a major impact on the person’s ability to concentrate and benefit from school,”he added.

For example, individuals with contamination fears may not be able to sit in the classroom or might have to constantly visit the toilet to perform rituals, such as hand-washing.

Other common rituals include the need to re-read or re-write sentences many times, which makes learning slow and frustrating, she added.

“Everyone who regularly works with persons who have obsessive-compulsive disorder has seen that their patients often struggle with school work.”

It is not uncommon for these individuals to have poor school attendance and severe patients can be out of the education system altogether, she noted.

“We have long suspected that OCD has a detrimental impact on the person’s education, with all the consequences that this entails (worse chances to enter the labor market and have a high paid job), but we did not really know to what extent OCD impacts education.”

Researchers analyzed data from several national registers on more than 2 million people born  between January 1, 1976, and December 21, 1998. Follow-up information was available through the end of 2013.

About 15,000 of the people included in the analysis had been diagnosed with OCD and 81 percent of these had additional psychiatric diagnoses. That compares to 13.6 percent of the group without OCD who had other psychological conditions. In addition to the broad analysis, the study team compared sibling pairs in about 700,000 families.

The researchers looked at who attained several educational milestones in the school system.
Compared to people without OCD, those with the condition were 40 percent to 65 percent less likely to pass all their compulsory education courses in their middle-teens, and were 53 percent less likely to move on to an upper secondary vocational school program and 39 percent less likely to get into an academic upper secondary program.

People with OCD were also 57 percent less likely to finish upper secondary school, 28 percent less likely to start a university degree program, 41 percent less likely to finish one and 48 percent less likely to complete postgraduate education.

“OCD was associated with pervasive academic underachievement across the lifespan, compared to matched population controls.” she said.

The association wasn’t specific to a particular school subject, she noted. “We found that patients were more likely to fail every single course or subject at the end of compulsory education, including each of the core subjects.”

As expected, the association was stronger in individuals first diagnosed in childhood/adolescence, though patients with a later age of onset were still substantially impaired across the board, she added.

“OCD sufferers also need to cope with the social consequences of their symptoms, which they may perceive as embarrassing,” she said. Severe cases may be housebound and unable to attend school altogether, and it is not uncommon for families to arrange home tuition for their children.

“We also observe that it is difficult for young people to return to school even if they have had a successful treatment with us. Considerable efforts are needed from the families, schools and mental health professionals to try to get these kids back on track,” she said.

THIS IS ONLY FOR INFORMATION, ALWAYS CONSULT YOU PHYSICIAN BEFORE HAVING ANY PARTICULAR FOOD/ MEDICATION/EXERCISE/OTHER REMEDIES.   

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Healthy preterm babies have academic difficulties

Scientists have claimed that premature babies are at higher risk for lower academic achievement, especially in mathematics.

A psychiatrist said that preterm children, who are deemed "normal" in terms of their development at infant/toddler stages, may still remain at risk for significant math difficulties, as well as deficits in attention, executive functions, and spatial skills.

She said that recent studies have identified a common pattern of subtle abnormality in the deep white matter of the brain among children born very premature.

Dr. asserted that these early abnormalities may affect the subsequent development of widely distributed brain areas, and may account for the patterns of cognitive deficit that are observed later in childhood.

She explained that however, there is currently very little data actually linking these neural abnormalities with the emergence of such deficits and associated early academic difficulties.

She said that the goal of the current study is to provide these essential data as children enter a critical developmental stage when intervention may have the best potential to achieve better outcomes for these children.

The study participants will include 60 healthy children born at 25 to 32 gestational weeks with average intelligence, and 40 full-term children matched for age, sex and verbal IQ.

Children will enter the study within six months of entering kindergarten and will be followed for three years. The scientists predict that specific early perceptual and cognitive deficits will be related to math deficits that emerge as children start school.

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