Foster care associated with improved growth, intelligence compared to orphanage care

April, 2010

A study involving healthy institutionalized infants from six Romanian orphanages has found that those randomly assigned to a foster care program showed rapid increases in height and weight, and that this was associated with better caregiving quality and significantly improved verbal IQ.

A study involving 136 healthy institutionalized infants (average age 21 months) from six orphanages in Bucharest, Romania, has found that those randomly assigned to a foster care program showed rapid increases in height and weight (but not head circumference), so that by 12 months, all of them were in the normal range for height, 90% were in the normal range for weight, and 94% were in the normal range of weight for height. Caregiving quality (particularly sensitivity and positive regard for the child, including physical affection) positively correlated with catch-up. Children whose height caught up to normal levels also appeared to improve their cognitive abilities. Each incremental increase of one in standardized height scores between baseline and 42 months was associated with an average increase of 12.6 points in verbal IQ.

Reference: 

Error | About memory

Error

The website encountered an unexpected error. Please try again later.