Parental Education, Household Income, Race, and Children’s Working Memory: Complexity of the Effects

Abstract

Background. Considerable research has linked social determinants of health (SDoHs) such as race, parental education, and household income to school performance, and these effects may be in part due to working memory. However, a growing literature shows that these effects may be complex: while the effects of parental education may be diminished for Blacks than Whites, household income may explain such effects. Purpose. Considering race as sociological rather than a biological construct (race as a proxy of racism) and built on Minorities’ Diminished Returns (MDRs), this study explored complexities of the effects of SDoHs on children’s working memory. Methods. We borrowed data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study. The total sample was 10,418, 9- and 10-year-old children. The independent variables were race, parental education, and household income. The primary outcome was working memory measured by the NIH Toolbox Card Sorting Test. Age, sex, ethnicity, and parental marital status were the covariates. To analyze the data, we used mixed-effect regression models. Results. High parental education and household income were associated with higher and Black race was associated with lower working memory. The association between high parental education but not household income was less pronounced for Black than White children. This differential effect of parental education on working memory was explained by household income. Conclusions. For American children, parental education generates unequal working memory, depending on race. This means parental education loses some of its expected effects for Black families. It also suggests that while White children with highly educated parents have the highest working memory, Black children report lower working memory, regardless of their parental education. This inequality is mainly because of differential income in highly educated White and Black families. This finding has significant public policy and economic implications and suggests we need to do far more than equalizing education to eliminate racial inequalities in children’s cognitive outcomes. While there is a need for multilevel policies that reduce the effect of racism and social stratification for middle-class Black families, equalizing income may have more returns than equalizing education.

Parental Educational Attainment, the Superior Temporal Cortical Surface Area, and Reading Ability among American Children: A Test of Marginalization-Related Diminished Returns

“…This reading ability result may also indicate that families can overcome the negative effects of MDRs when they engage in enrichment activities of their own, but this does not change the fact that fundamental structural change is necessary because such activities are essentially a tax for black families as a way to keep up with their more privileged white counterparts. In some recent ABCD study data analyses, the SES effects on neurocognitive domains are weaker for black than white children [ 60 , 77 , 105 ]. In one study, the effects of parental education on mental rotation (a specific cognitive task) was weaker in black than white children [ 107 ].…”

“…Built on the MDRs phenomenon overall [ 44 , 45 , 75 , 76 ], MDRs of parental education on cognitive ability [ 60 , 62 , 63 , 77 ], school performance [ 53 , 54 , 55 , 57 ], and brain structures [ 41 ] in particular, we used data from Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study [ 75 , 76 , 77 , 78 , 79 , 80 , 81 , 82 ] to compare the associations between parental educational attainment, the superior temporal cortical surface area, and readability across diverse racial/ethnic groups in a large, diverse national sample of American children. In line with a recent work by Merz [ 34 ], we hypothesized positive associations between parental educational attainment, the superior temporal cortical surface area, and children’s reading ability.…”

“…In line with the MDRs described above, our analysis of the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) data shows that the effects of SES indicators, particularly parental education, on brain function and structure are weaker for black than white children. For example, the effects of parental education on attention, working memory, and inhibitory control are all weaker for black than white children [ 58 , 59 , 60 ]. Analysis of the sMRI and fMRI data from the same sample also indicates that SES effects on hippocampus and amygdala volume [ 61 ] and the cortical surface area [ 41 ] were weaker for black than white children.…”

The Exposome and its Associations with Broad Mental and Physical Health Measures in Early Adolescence

“…For example, since parental factors play a major role in childhood development, we included parental psychopathology in our analyses, even though we acknowledge that genetic contributions of parental psychopathology also exist in the child. Furthermore, because we wanted to investigate the utility of applying an exposome framework, we excluded two pivotal measures commonly used to estimate environment, including in previous ABCD Study research: household income 40,41 and parental education 42 . This choice allowed us (1) to test the "added value" of the exposome scores to explain variance in health outcomes over and above commonly used proxies of environment known to associate with developmental outcomes 43 , including in ABCD Study 41 ; and (2) to validate the exposome scores using "classic" indicators of socioeconomic environment.…”

Resting-State Functional Connectivity between Putamen and Salience Network and Childhood Body Mass Index

“…According to minorities' diminished returns (MDRs) [17], observed across study designs, cohorts, settings, age groups, socioeconomic status (SES) indicators, and health outcomes [18,19], individual-level risk and protective factors show weaker associations with outcomes of racial and ethnic minority people compared to Non-Hispanic Whites. For example, SES shows weaker associations with brain structure and function of Non-Hispanic Blacks than Non-Hispanic Whites [20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27]. The same pattern is shown for SES effects on trauma [28], attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) [29], suicide [27], depression [30], aggression [31], tobacco use [31][32][33], impulsivity [34], school bonding [35], school performance [36], math performance [37], attention [38], and inhibitory control [39] in Non-Hispanic Black children compared with Non-Hispanic White children.…”