Breastfeeding and later psychosocial development in the Philippines

Abstract

Objectives-Evaluate whether breastfeeding duration predicts later psychosocial development in a large low socioeconomic status (SES) sample in the Philippines.Methods-The sample consists of 2,752 children aged 5-6 years who were measured in 2004 as part of the Philippine government's Early Childhood Development Project (ECD). Duration of any breastfeeding was the primary independent variable in regression models predicting a cumulative index of psychosocial development that has been shown previously to predict school readiness.Results-In this sample, mothers who breastfed their children for longer tended to have lower educational attainment and to come from lower income households. Despite this, breastfeeding duration was a positive predictor of future psychosocial development (PD) measured in late childhood, but only after adjustment for SES and related confounders.Conclusions-These findings add to growing evidence that breastfeeding could provide lasting economic and social benefits and underscore the importance of continuing current public health efforts to promote breastfeeding in the Philippines and across the globe.

Breastfeeding up to two years of age or beyond and its influence on child growth and development: a systematic review

“…Daniels & Adair 27 and Duazo et al 28 , Oddy et al 8 , Victora et al 9 and Slykerman et al 41 , all suggested that shorter breastfeeding duration may be associated with higher cognitive ability scores 27 , higher psychosocial development scores 28 , fewer internalization problems 8 , better school performance 9 and better performance in IQ tests 41 . However, the association reported in these articles was not assessed as a breastfeeding duration of less than two years is beyond the scope of this review.…”

“…Duazo et al 28 analyzed data from a cohort study of 2,752 children aged five to six years in the Philippines. Follow-ups were conducted at yearly intervals, with a total of four surveys completed by the end of the study in 2005.…”

“…A further article assessed the effects of breastfeeding on cognitive ability at 8.5 and 11.5 years of age using the Philippines Nonverbal Intelligence Test 27 . Finally, one article also assessed psychosocial development at five and six years of age using the Philippines Revised Early Childhood Development Checklist 28 . Three articles reported a negative or null effect of breastfeeding up to two years of age or beyond on different aspects of growth.…”

Infant Feeding and School Attainment in Five Cohorts from Low- and Middle-Income Countries

“…Some studies have reported that duration of breastfeeding is positively related to performance in intelligence tests or achieved schooling, [5], [26]–[33] whereas other ones have observed a non-linear association, with a decrease in the effect of breastfeeding among those subjects who are breastfed for longer periods [8], [25], [34]–[37]. This heterogeneity among the studies may be due to differences in the categorization of breastfeeding duration, seven of the nine studies reporting a linear trend had >4 or >6 months as the highest category for breastfeeding duration, whereas the decrease in the effect of breastfeeding was observed among children breastfed for a longer time, ranging from 26+ weeks [34] to 24+ months [25], [35]. We also assessed the effect of the continuous variable duration of breastfeeding in months and the analyses carried out for each site were not statistically significant.…”

Prolonged breastfeeding for 24 months or more and mental health at 6 years of age: evidence from the 2004 Pelotas Birth Cohort Study, Brazil

“…These two studies did not report any impact (positive or detrimental) of breastfeeding for 2 years or more on child development. (Daniels & Adair, ; Duazo, Avila, & Kuzawa, ). A study from the Millenium Cohort Study reported that longer duration of breastfeeding was associated with better educational achievent at age 5 (Heikkila, Kelly, Renfrew, Sacker, & Quigley, ).…”