summary: breastfeeding and language development

Thu May 4 15:18:06 UTC 2006

Leah,
This detailed summary is a remarkable service you just provided to all 
childes readers.  Thank you.

Chris Boyatzis

At 06:15 AM 5/4/2006, leah gedalyovich wrote:
>Dear All,
>Here is my original question on breastfeeding and language
>development. Apologies for the delay in posting the summary.
>
>This question came up from a discussion with a friend who is a
>lactation consultant. There seems to be a given that breastfeeding is
>better than any other alternative for virtually every aspect of
>development. Is there any published research on the relationship
>between breastfeeding and language development? If any relationship is
>found is it attributed to nutritional issues or to other issues
>(emotional, sensori-motor, etc)
>
>I received many more responses than I expected. Thank you to all who
>took the time to answer  Anat Ninio, Natasha Ringblom, J. Tomblin,
>Katherine Demuth, Nina Capone, Carolyn Bick-Gengler, Katie Alcock, Peg
>Lahey, Lynne Hewitt, Jim Morgan, and Ruth. My apologies if I have
>unintentionally left anyone out. Here is my summary:
>
>Some people consider suggested that any relationship between
>breastfeeding and language development would be related to emotional
>issues (Katherine Demuth)  with either positive effects, e.g. Natasha
>Ringblom's personal experience of her breastfed children acquiring
>Swedish and Russian, or likely negative effects or possible negative
>effects from pressure on mothers to breastfeed (anat ninio with a
>reference to an article in the Israeli paper Haaretz about the
>non-effects of breastfeeding on practically anything, starting with
>infant health and continuing with intelligence.  The URL is below.
>
>
>http://www.haaretz.co.il/hasite/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=507898&contrassID=2&subContrassID=2&sbSubContrassID=0
>
>
>There were some suggestions of  positive oral motor development
>connected with breastfeeding in typically and non-typically developing
>breastfed children:
>
>Carolyn Buck-Gengler's account of her extra motivation for
>breastfeeding her (still pre-verbal) two year old son born with Down's
>Syndrome, likely improved oral motor strength suggested by
>occupational and physiotherapists.
>
>Actual research papers deal with breastfeeding as a protective factor:
>Breastfeeding is seen as protecting against the developmental langauge
>impairments ... breastfeeding was a protective factor and the longer
>the breastfeeding the better the effect. The reference being
>D.L. Drane, D. L. &  Logemann, J.  (2000). A critical evaluation of
>the evidence on the association between type of infant feeding and
>cognitive development.  Paediatric & Perinatal Epidemiology, 14  349
>And an earlier reference on prenatal and infancy risk factors for SLI
>at 6 years of age that included retrospective information on
>breastfeeding.  When mother's education was controlled breastfeeding
>was a significant protective factor for language outcome (odds ratio=
>0.5).  We also found that there was a dose effect in that longer
>periods of breastfeeding had a stronger effect than shorter periods.
>Tomblin, J. B., Smith, E., & Zhang, X. (1997). Epidemiology of
>specific language impairment: Prenatal and perinatal risk factors.
>Journal of Communication Disorders, 30, 325-344.
>Specifically the positive effects of nutrition ( long-chain fatty
>acids) have been investigated:
>Willatts, P., Forsyth, J. S. DiModugno, M. K., Varma, S., & Colvin,
>M.(1998). Effect of long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids in infant
>formula on problem solving at 10 months of age. Lancet, 35 (9129),
>688-691.
>But these positive effects may not be specific to language development
>and in fact may show only in non-language areas.
>When there is control for any "bonding" or SES effects of
>breastfeeding -  an effect on some types of cognitive behaviour is
>shown in preverbal infants (e.g. problem solving in the above study).
>However other studies with similar designs have shown no effect on
>language of supplemented formula. e.g.
>Auestad, N., Scott, D. T., Janowsky, J. S., Jacobsen, C., Carroll, R.
>E., Montalto, M. B., et al. (2003). Visual, cognitive, and language
>assessments at 39 months: A follow-up study of children fed formulas
>containing long-chain olyunsaturated fatty acids to 1 year of age.
>Pediatrics, 112(3), E177-E183.
>Birch, E. E., Garfield, S., Hoffman, D. R., Uauy, R., & Birch, D. G.
>(2000). A randomized controlled trial of early dietary supply of long
>chain polyunsaturated fatty acids and mental development in term
>infants. Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology, 42(3), 174 181.
>(with thanx to Katie Alcock)
>In full term infants exclusively breastfed for at least 3 mos, their
>ability to discriminate nonnative phonetic contrasts at 9 months was
>related to their levels of DHA fatty acids at 2mos:
>Innis, S. M., Gilley, J., & Werker, J. (2001). Are human milk
>long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids related to visual and neural
>development in breast-fed term infants? Pediatrics, 139(4), 532-538. '
>
>A previous paper identified a relation between fatty acids and vocabulary 
>size.
>Scott, D. T., Janowsky, J. S., Carroll, R. E., Taylor, J. A., Auestad,
>N., MOntalto, M. B. (1998). Formula supplementation with long-chain
>polyunsaturated fatty acids: Are there developmental benefits? Pediatrics, 
>102, E59-64.
>
>(with thanx to Ruth)
>And thanx to Peg Lahey for this link:
>For a review of some literature prior to 2004 that includes this topic see
>the Bamford-Lahey Children's Foundation website www.bamford-lahey.org.
>The focus of the review is essential fatty acids but it includes some
>discussion of breastfeeding and development.  It was completed in 2002
>and updated in 2003.
>
>For direct access, click on first link below and then click section on
>infant development; for update click on 2nd link.  There is some
>support re vocabulary and verbal IQ and some suggestion that there may
>be a nutritional component related to the higher amount of omega3
>fatty acids found in breast milk vs. formula as it was constituted at
>the time [some changes recently].
>
>http://bamford-lahey.org/lipidsrev102.html#LIPIDS   for original paper
>http://www.bamford-lahey.org/update.html  for a short update in 2003.
>
>Still other research suggests positive effects of breastfeeding as
>secondary to improved health:
>
>A substantial number of articles in the pediatric literature report that
>reduced incidence of otitis media is associated with breastfeeding. This is
>probably due to a combination of factors including antibodies passed to the
>child through breast milk and the increased mechanical load in
>breastfeeding relative to bottle feeding, which promotes drainage of the
>Eustachian tubes (infants' Eustacian tubes are narrower and more horizontal
>than adults'). There is at least a weak relation between incidence of OME
>in infancy and phonological and lexical measures of language development.
>
>-- Jim Morgan
>
>While it is true that the IQ effects of breastfeeding are far from
>clear, if any exist, the fact that breastfeeding reduces infant
>exposure to waterborn bacterial and viral infections should mean that
>breast-fed infants have a health advantage. There is some evidence for
>increased oral motor strength from breastfeeding.
>
>        "Early weaning may lead to the interruption of proper oral
>motor development provoking alterations to the posture and strength of
>the speech organs and harming the functions of chewing, swallowing,
>breathing, and articulation of speech sounds. The lack of
>physiological sucking on the breast may interfere in the oral motor
>development, possibly causing malocclusion, oral respiration and oral
>motor disorders."
>
>Neiva et al, J Pediatr (Rio J) 2003;79(1):07-12
>Quoted on http://www.promom.org/101/, a non-profit promoting
>breastfeeding.  Lists many other reasons why breastfeeding is
>superior.
>
>There is also some evidence that pre-term infants have better oxygen
>saturation levels and less incidence of apnea during breast than
>bottle feeding. (Review available at
>http://www.asha.org/NR/rdonlyres/7BBBE03B-A34C-4052-95A3-742B1EAB11B4/0/v3TRnicu.pdf
>
>The below study found an effect of breastfeeding on oral motor/speech
>milestones:
>
>Acta Paediatr. 1999 Dec;88(12):1327-32.   Duration of breastfeeding
>and developmental milestones during the latter half of infancy.
>Vestergaard M, Obel C, Henriksen TB, Sorensen HT, Skajaa E, Ostergaard
>J. Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Aarhus University
>Hospital, Denmark.
>
>    Several studies have suggested that breastfeeding has a long-term
>influence on brain development. However, interpretation of these
>findings is complicated by the presence of many potential confounding
>factors. Only a few studies have examined infants before 1 y of age,
>although very early assessment might reduce the role of environmental
>influence. We investigated the association between exclusive
>breastfeeding and three developmental milestones related to general
>and fine motor skills and early language development at the age of 8
>mo. We followed 1656 healthy, singleton, term infants, with a
>birthweight of at least 2500 g, born between May 1991 and February
>1992 in Aarhus, Denmark. Information was collected at 16 wk gestation,
>at delivery and when the infant was 8 mo old. Motor skills were
>evaluated by measurement of crawling and pincer grip. Early language
>development was defined as the ability to babble in polysyllables. The
>proportion of infants who mastered the specific milestones increased
>consistently with increasing duration of breastfeeding. The relative
>risk for the highest versus the lowest breastfeeding category was 1.3
>(95% CI: 1.0-1.6) for crawling, 1.2 (95% CI: 1.1-1.3) for pincer grip
>and 1.5 (95% Cl: 1.3-1.8) for polysyllable babbling. Little change was
>found after adjustment for confounding. In conclusion, our data
>support the hypothesis that breastfeeding benefits neurodevelopment.
>
>    PMID: 10626516 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
>
>(with thanx to Lynne Hewitt)
>
>And to summarize: the picture is still far from clear, for positive
>effects for language development and even for general cognitive and
>emotional development, but there is a growing body of controlled
>research  which we can expect will clarify the situation and aid our
>decision making for ourselves and for advising others. Thanx again,
>Leah
>

Chris J. Boyatzis, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Psychology
Department of Psychology
Bucknell University
Lewisburg PA  17837

Office phone:  570.577.1696
FAX  570.577.7007
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/info-childes/attachments/20060504/9d746dbc/attachment.htm>