Love helps kids beat poverty, study reports

MILWAUKEE — Children who are outgoing and receive lots of love and support from their mothers are better equipped to overcome the negative effects of poverty, a new study shows.

The combination, though not surprising, suggests that genetics and motherly love can work together to fight against poverty, allowing many children to dodge emotional setbacks and potential conduct problems.

“The main point of the research is that neither genes nor poverty can determine a child’s fate,” said Julia Kim-Cohen, study co-author and a postdoctoral fellow in psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the Institute of Psychiatry at King’s College in London.

“Many children, and parents, use their natural talents and abilities to turn lemons into lemonade,” she said.

But the results raise another, more basic question that has intrigued many researchers for decades:

Why do some people escape adversity relatively unscathed while others seem to get hit by every bad thing it has to offer?

“It’s been clear for a number of years that individuals contribute to their own outcomes and that we’re not just the passive beneficiaries or victims of fate,” said Mark Sims, professor of pediatrics at the Medical College of Wisconsin and the director of the child development center at Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin.

“Fortunately or unfortunately, some people start out with a little more than others, but within these parameters, there are things that people can do to modify their situations.”

For the study, researchers analyzed responses from 1,116 mothers with 5-year-old same-sex twins to determine the impact of hereditary traits and environment on children’s cognitive and behavioral resilience to poverty.

Many of the participants in England and Wales were single parents, lived in substandard housing, were unemployed, had little or no education and had no access to cars.

According to the study, published in the journal Child Development, children who had mothers who were actively involved in their lives and who interacted positively with them, performed better on behavior and intelligence tests than those who didn’t receive the same support.

In addition, the children who were more resilient to the effects of poverty tended to be more sociable and good-natured.

“For many years, scientists have acknowledged that it is no longer a question of nature versus nurture, but that the interplay of both nature and nurture are important,” Kim-Cohen said. “Also, it makes sense that a person’s genetic endowment would help protect them from life’s slings and arrows.”

But what does it all mean?

“One size doesn’t fit all,” Sims said.