Living Near Green Space Associated With Fewer Emotional Problems in Preschool-Age Kids, NIH Study Finds

Posted on by Jodi Snare

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

 

Children who live in areas with natural spaces (e.g., forests, parks, backyards) from birth may experience fewer emotional issues between the ages of 2 and 5, according to a study funded by the NIH Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) program.

While research has suggested that time in nature is important for mental health, studies examining the effects on young children are limited. ECHO investigators addressed this research gap by analyzing information from parents about the behavior of their children from ages 2 to 11. They combined this data with the family’s residential address when the child was born and satellite data on live vegetation density around their homes.

What researchers found in their analysis, published in JAMA Network Open, was that higher levels of green spaces up to three-fourths of a mile from a child’s home were linked with lower anxiety and depression symptoms from ages 2 to 5 years. The association persisted even after researchers factored in the child’s sex, parent education, age at birth, and neighborhood socioeconomic vulnerability. Researchers did not find a significant association between green space around the home and mental health symptoms in later childhood years from ages 6 to 11, when children spend more time at school.

“Our research supports existing evidence that being in nature is good for kids,” said Nissa Towe-Goodman, PhD, an ECHO researcher from the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. “It also suggests that the early childhood years are a crucial time for exposure to green spaces.”

Most research so far has been limited to studying one or a few cities at a time, and focused on adult health. Because the ECHO Program collects data nationwide, researchers were able to examine data from children in 199 counties across 41 U.S. states, exploring the connection between exposure to green spaces from birth and anxiety, depression, aggression, and other symptoms during early or middle childhood.

The study included children born between 2007 and 2013 and whose parents completed the Child Behavior Checklist, a common survey to rate a child’s emotional and behavioral symptoms. The 2,103 children included in the study ranged in age from 2 to 11, spanning early and middle childhood.

Green space exposure was measured using the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), a widely used metric for quantifying vegetation density using sensor data. NDVI values range from -1 to 1. High NDVI values (approximately 0.6 to 0.9) represent dense vegetation, such as forests; values close to zero represent areas without live vegetation.

“In the future, researchers could look into what kinds of experiences in nature are connected to kids' early mental health,” said Dr. Towe-Goodman. “Also, we should study how creating or preserving natural areas around homes and schools might make a difference in a child’s mental health.”

Dr. Towe-Goodman lead this collaborative research in JAMA Network Open.

###

About ECHO:

Launched in 2016, the Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program is a research program in the Office of the Director at the NIH with the mission to enhance the health of children for generations to come. ECHO investigators study the effects of a broad range of early environmental influences on child health and development. For more information, visit echochildren.org.

About the NIH: NIH, the nation’s medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information, visit www.nih.gov.

 

Media Contacts

For information or to request an interview, contact Rebekah Yeager,  rebekah.yeager@nih.gov.

If you are not a member of the media, but have a general inquiry, please contact  NIHKidsandEnvironment@od.nih.gov.

Connect With Us

echo connectorCheck out the recent issues of our bi-monthly newsletter, the ECHO Connector, for program news and the latest research findings.

To receive the ECHO Connector through email, subscribe here.

Follow @ECHOChildHealth on X for the latest ECHO Program updates.

Ways ECHO Investigators Conduct Important Research on How Maternal Health, Exposures, and Habits Influence Child Health

Posted on by Jodi Snare

ECHO has already produced several exciting publications so far this year, many of which have amassed media attention. The year is off to a great start for the ECHO Program. In the March 2024 ECHO Connector, we focus on the ways ECHO investigators are conducting important research on how maternal health, exposures, and habits influence child health. Learn about two recent research articles, one of which reports on ECHO Cohort studies of chemical exposure and the other on the benefits of early breastfeeding, in the News You Can Use section.

In the January ECHO Connector, I highlighted the public availability of de-identified ECHO data and new NIH funding opportunities for the intervention research arm of ECHO. Both are important to the future success of the ECHO Program. Here are more details:

  • De-identified data from the ECHO Cohort are available to any qualified researcher through the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute for Child Health and Development (NICHD) Data and Specimen Hub (DASH). This resource, containing data from over 60,000 ECHO Cohort participants, allows members of the broad scientific community to answer important research questions about the origins of child health outcomes. Learn more about this dataset and how to request access.
  • The ECHO Program Office recently announced two Notices of Funding Opportunity (NOFOs) for a third 5-year cycle of the ECHO Institutional Development Award (IDeA) States Pediatric Clinical Trials Network (ISPCTN). We also recently posted Frequently Asked Questions and prerecorded webinars regarding these opportunities. We welcome applications from entities/institutions in IDeA-eligible states to participate in the ECHO ISPCTN as either a Clinical Site or the Data Coordinating and Operations Center (DCOC). These awards will support state-of-the-art pediatric clinical trials in states with historically low rates of NIH funding. Applications are due April 15; please spread the word!

I’m glad the word is getting out about ECHO results, the fruits of efforts of hundreds of researchers and tens of thousands of participants. On behalf of the entire ECHO Program, I thank you for partnering with us to disseminate our research, which is enhancing the health of children for generations to come.

—Matthew W. Gillman, MD, SM

New ECHO Research Reveals Link Between Phthalate Exposure During Pregnancy and Multiple Health Outcomes in Children

Posted on by Jodi Snare

Drew Day, PhD

Collaborative ECHO research led by Drew Day, PhD of Seattle Children’s Research Institute uses machine learning statistical algorithms to explore patterns of health outcomes in children. The researchers also investigated how exposures during pregnancy to phthalates—chemicals widely used in plastics that have previously been linked with preterm birth—can influence the development of multiple health conditions during childhood. This research, titled “Subpopulations of children with multiple chronic health outcomes in relation to chemical exposures in the ECHO-PATHWAYS consortium,” is published in Environment International.

Chronic health conditions, such as asthma and obesity, can develop together during childhood but are usually studied separately. The goal of this study was to use data from ECHO Cohort research sites across six U.S. cities to characterize “clusters,” or patterns, of obesity-related, lung health, and brain development outcomes in children and to investigate how these patterns relate to mothers’ exposures to phthalates during pregnancy.

ECHO researchers looked at 15 health outcomes in 1,092 children between the ages of 4 and 9 across six U.S. cities and collected measurements of phthalate exposure during pregnancy from 856 of these children’s mothers. Outcomes collected during this study included body mass index (BMI), IQ, anxiety, depression, irritability, learning disabilities, speech problems, asthma, wheeze, and nasal allergies. The researchers evaluated how children developed multiple outcomes and investigated how the probability of being in a particular group was affected by exposure to 15 plastic-associated phthalate chemicals during pregnancy. The researchers measured phthalate exposure during pregnancy using urine samples collected from 2007–2014 from mothers during late pregnancy.

The researchers identified three groups of children with a pattern of health outcomes that occurred together:

  1. A group of relatively healthy children;
  2. A group of children with lower IQs, elevated obesity, and slightly elevated asthma-related outcomes such as asthma, wheezing, and allergies; and
  3. Another group of children with high asthma-related outcomes along with elevated obesity and some increase in anxiety- and depression-related outcomes.

Compared to children in the healthy group, other groups had more male children, mothers with higher BMI and lower education attainment, and lower household incomes. The researchers found that children—particularly boys—were more likely to be in the third group if their mothers were exposed to phthalates during pregnancy.

These findings suggest that exposure to phthalates during pregnancy might be associated with an increased risk of developing not only asthma and related lung outcomes, but also obesity and mental health issues such as anxiety and depression. This study also suggests that low-income households are at higher risk for worse childhood health outcomes.

“The three patterns of health outcomes seen in this study reveal more about how pediatric diseases might arise together,” said Dr. Day. “The insights from this study could help inform future research on what biological processes contribute to these health outcome patterns as well as better treatments and interventions to enhance child health.”

This study’s multi-outcome approach can be used in future studies to identify public health risks that may affect central biological processes that result in multiple negative health outcomes. ECHO Cohort researchers are working to extend this method to include several additional U.S. research sites, which will allow them to evaluate whether similar patterns are observed in a larger dataset. Larger studies will also help researchers characterize how demographic differences like income and sex may influence the development of multiple health outcomes during childhood.

Read the research summary.

Neighborhood-Level Poverty and Food Insecurity During Pregnancy Associated With Lower Birthweight and Small for Gestational Age Infants, NIH Study Finds

Posted on by Jodi Snare

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

 

Living in neighborhoods where residents have lower incomes and limited food access during pregnancy was associated with an increased risk of babies born small for gestational age or with lower birthweight, according to a new study from the NIH Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program.

Previous studies have shown that maternal diet during pregnancy can impact the physical and mental health of a mother. However, less is known about how food insecurity affects health outcomes for newborns. In a new research article, ECHO researchers analyzed data to understand what connections might exist between where a pregnant person lives, their access to food, and birth outcomes.

This ECHO analysis, recently published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, indicates a possible connection.

“Given the long-term effects of adverse birth outcomes on later cardiovascular disease risk and other conditions, more research is needed to evaluate whether interventions and policies that improve food access during pregnancy would be effective in improving birth outcomes and promoting child health,” said Izzuddin M. Aris, PhD, of the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute.

Using nationwide data from more than 22,000 ECHO Cohort participants, a team of ECHO researchers found that, during pregnancy, 24% of those participants lived in a low-income neighborhood where a third or more residents lived over one mile from a grocery store (or more than 10 miles in rural areas). They also found that about 14% of the participants lived in neighborhoods with high poverty rates and where more than 100 households had no access to a vehicle and lived more than half a mile from the nearest grocery store.

Residence in low-income, low-food-access and low-income, low-vehicle-access neighborhoods was associated with lower birth weight, higher odds of babies born small for gestational age, and lower odds of babies born large for gestational age. However, researchers did not find any associations of individual food insecurity with birth outcomes.

To conduct this study, researchers matched pregnant individuals' home addresses with information about nearby food availability from the U.S. Food Access Research Atlas, which provided data on household income, the availability of a household vehicle, and where people can access food in different neighborhoods.

“In future studies, we want to look at health habits and chemical exposures to understand what else could be affecting birth outcomes,” said Dr. Aris.

Dr. Aris led a team of ECHO Cohort researchers from across the country who collaborated on the data analysis and writing for this research article.

###

About ECHO: Launched in 2016, the Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program is a research program in the Office of the Director at the NIH with the mission to enhance the health of children for generations to come. ECHO investigators study the effects of a broad range of early environmental influences on child health and development. For more information, visit echochildren.org.

About the NIH: NIH, the nation’s medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information, visit www.nih.gov.

Read the research summary.

Media Contacts

For information or to request an interview, contact Rebekah Yeager,  rebekah.yeager@nih.gov.

If you are not a member of the media, but have a general inquiry, please contact  NIHKidsandEnvironment@od.nih.gov.

Connect With Us

echo connectorCheck out the recent issues of our bi-monthly newsletter, the ECHO Connector, for program news and the latest research findings.

To receive the ECHO Connector through email, subscribe here.

Follow @ECHOChildHealth for the latest ECHO Program updates on X (formerly known as Twitter).

ECHO Researchers Examine Fish Consumption and Supplement Use Among Pregnant People

Posted on by Jodi Snare

Collaborative ECHO research led by Emily Oken, MD, MPH of Harvard Medical School and the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute, and Kristen Lyall, ScD of Drexel University, investigates fish consumption and the use of omega-3 supplements among pregnant people.

This research, titled “Demographic and health characteristics associated with fish and n-3 fatty acid supplement intake during pregnancy: results from pregnancy cohorts in the ECHO program,” is published in Public Health Nutrition.

Omega-3 fatty acids, also known as n-3 fatty acids, are essential nutrients during pregnancy for supporting child health and neurodevelopment and may also improve other pregnancy outcomes. Fish intake is the primary source of these nutrients in the diet. Prior research on who eats fish and uses supplements during pregnancy has been limited, involving fewer participants and older data that may not represent current consumption.

This study included 10,800 pregnant people enrolled by 23 ECHO Cohort study sites that collected information on fish consumption, and 12,646 participants at 35 sites that collected information on omega-3 supplement use. While the ECHO Program began 2016, some study sites had been collecting participant data for many years before. In this study, information on fish consumption and omega-3 supplement use was collected from pregnant participants from 1999 to 2020.

After collecting this information, the researchers sorted participant data based on how often they ate fish: never or less than once per month, once per month to less than once per week, one to two times per week, or more than twice per week. They then compared participant fish consumption and supplement use across various demographic and lifestyle factors, including age, race, ethnicity, education, weight, and smoking status.

The research team observed that about 25% of pregnant participants did not eat any fish or ate fish less than once per month, but older participants were more likely to eat fish. Participants who were non-Hispanic Black, non-Hispanic Asian, or Hispanic ate less fish on average than those who identified as non-Hispanic White. Participants categorized as overweight were also less likely to eat fish.

Omega-3 supplement use was also rare—with only 1 in 6 study participants reporting taking omega-3 supplements. Supplement use was more common in participants who were older and had more education, a lower body mass index (BMI), and a diet that included fish.

“This study observed that one-quarter of participants in this large nationwide dataset rarely or never consumed fish during pregnancy, and omega-3 supplement use was uncommon, even among those who did not consume fish,” Dr. Oken said.

Experts recommend that people need additional omega-3 fatty acids during pregnancy. Ongoing effective public health advice and resources to support clinicians are needed to encourage consumption of low-mercury fish during pregnancy and intake of omega-3 supplements among those who do not consume fish.

Read the research summary.

New ECHO Research Study Relationship Between Maternal Education and Children’s Neurocognitive Development Over Time

Posted on by Jodi Snare

Collaborative ECHO research led by Santiago Morales, PhD of the University of Southern California investigates the relationship between maternal education and children’s neurocognitive development over time. This research, titled “Maternal Education Prospectively Predicts Child Neurocognitive Function: An ECHO Study,” is published in Developmental Psychology.

ECHO researchers wanted to examine the relationship between changes in a mother’s education over time and their children’s later neurocognitive functioning, such as executive function and language skills. Studies to date have focused on early childhood outcomes and have treated a mother’s education as unchanging over time.

This study included 2,688 children, adolescents, and young adults from 3 to 20 years of age at ECHO research sites in 42 states across the U.S.

Mothers reported their own education levels during pregnancy and their child’s infancy, and again, years later when their children’s neurocognitive functions were also assessed. For both periods, the study categorized the mother’s education level into one of five groups—less than high school; high school or GED equivalent degree; some college, associate degree or trade school; bachelor’s degree; and graduate degree. The same categories were used to measure maternal education during childhood. Maternal education and income are two commonly used indicators of socioeconomic status. However, missing income data in this study prevented investigators from fully assessing the impact of socioeconomic status and income on neurocognitive skills.

Researchers also measured child participants’ cognitive abilities during childhood, adolescence, or young adulthood using the NIH Toolbox Cognition Battery. These tests assess aspects of cognition including language, memory, and problem solving. Test results created scores that reflected language skills, executive function, and overall brain function. The analysis included child participants who contributed at least one score.

This study found that a mother’s education level during pregnancy and infancy was associated with children’s language and executive function. Increases in maternal education were related to improved language performance but were not associated with executive functioning performance.

“These results suggest that further examining these associations can provide important insights that can help inform policies and interventions designed to foster neurocognitive development,” said Dr. Morales.

Future research can explore the factors involved in the suggested association between maternal education and a child’s neurocognitive development.

Read the research summary.

 

New ECHO Study Finds No Statistically Significant Associations Between Small Molecules During Pregnancy and Childhood BMI

Posted on by Jodi Snare

Collaborative ECHO research led by Rachel Kelly, PhD and Nicole Prince, PhD, of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, and Donghai Liang, PhD, MPH of Emory University analyzes the relationship between small molecules in a mother’s blood during pregnancy and childhood BMI. This research, titled “Metabolomic Data Presents Challenges for Epidemiological Meta-Analysis: A Case Study of Childhood Body Mass Index from the ECHO Consortium,” is published in Metabolomics.

A child’s body mass index (BMI) can affect their future health. Some researchers are exploring the connection between factors during pregnancy and childhood BMI. Increasingly, researchers use molecular data to analyze the relationship between pregnancy and childhood health outcomes, sometimes combining molecular data from multiple study sites to increase the statistical power of these analyses.

In this study, ECHO researchers combined the results from multiple ECHO Cohort Study Sites to determine whether a relationship existed between small molecules in the mother’s blood during pregnancy and their child’s later BMI. It also aimed to use these data to test a framework for analyzing molecular data across multiple studies.

The study involved mothers in the second and third trimesters of pregnancy and their children from multiple study sites: the Atlanta ECHO Cohort, the New Hampshire Birth Cohort, and the Vitamin D Antenatal Asthma Reduction Trial. Pregnant participants from these sites provided blood samples, which were then used to measure a range of small molecules that provide information on each participant’s health and environment and the biological or genetic factors that could affect their pregnancy. These participants and their children were observed and assessed across pregnancy and the child’s early life. In this analysis, the authors used data from the aforementioned three study sites to evaluate the relationship between molecules measured during pregnancy and BMI at age 2, aiming to identify relationships that were consistent across all three.

The research team found that of all the small molecules tested, 20 showed up in all study sites, and 127 showed up in at least two. The study found that the levels of only six small molecules, primarily related to maternal diet, were associated with child BMI across all sites. However, statistical analysis across these study sites did not identify significant associations between these molecules and child BMI.

This study demonstrates some of the challenges of harmonizing molecular data across diverse study sites and highlights important considerations for researchers trying to conduct similar analyses.

“Differences in how molecular data were collected and measured between the sites in this study made it difficult to draw strong conclusions on the relationship between small molecules during pregnancy and childhood BMI,” Dr. Kelly said. “Future analyses could involve larger, more standardized studies that all use the same methods for sample collection and measurement of molecules present, which would improve the reliability and reproducibility of results.”

Many ECHO Cohort Study Sites are now measuring small molecules in mothers and children with a standardized approach under the ECHO Cohort Data Collection Protocol. ECHO researchers have an opportunity to use these data to power analyses that can explore the relationship between pregnancy health and child health outcomes.

Read the research summary.

Early-Life Airborne Lead Exposure Associated With Lower IQ and Self-Control in NIH Study

Posted on by Jodi Snare

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Children who lived in areas with higher levels of airborne lead in their first five years of life appeared to have slightly lower IQs and less self-control, with boys showing more sensitivity to lead exposure, according to a new study from the NIH Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program.

Lead exposure, even at low levels, can affect cognitive and physical development in children. While children’s blood lead levels have decreased in recent decades, inequities persist in areas with older, poorly maintained housing or inadequate water system management. There is limited research on how airborne lead from industrial emissions affects children.

ECHO Cohort researchers wanted to learn if airborne lead exposure is associated with children’s IQ and executive functioning. Their analysis, published in the American Journal of Public Health, suggests there may be an association between lead released into the air and children’s brain development.

“To ensure that children have a fair chance at healthy development, reducing the environmental pollution in general and focusing on factors such as nutrition could lessen the impact of lead exposure on children’s development,” said study author Lisa Gatzke-Kopp, PhD of Penn State.

In the study, lower average IQ scores were associated with high levels of airborne lead exposure in children between the ages of 4 and 8. A similar association was observed with executive function between the ages of 3 and 8, but only for impulse control and not the ability to follow changes in instructions. The association with impulse control was more pronounced in boys.

Click map to enlarge

To gain these insights, investigators used residential address data of more than 3,000 children from 14 ECHO Cohorts combined with an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) database of historical and geographically specific estimates of airborne lead levels. After calculating the average lead exposures for each child over the course of their first five years, researchers analyzed their IQ and cognitive test scores from ages 3 to 8, while accounting for a number of additional factors, such as socioeconomic status.

These findings are consistent with a previous study, reinforcing the importance of examining air pollution and child development. However, researchers pointed out that other chemicals could also play a role, and factors like nutrition might help mitigate the effects of lead exposure.

Future studies can examine whether other factors in a child’s environment modify lead pollution and why boys appear to be more susceptible.

Dr. Gatzke-Kopp led this collaborative research in the American Journal of Public Health.

### 

About ECHO:

Launched in 2016, the Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program is a research program in the Office of the Director at the NIH with the mission to enhance the health of children for generations to come. ECHO investigators study the effects of a broad range of early environmental influences on child health and development. For more information, visit echochildren.org.

About the NIH: NIH, the nation’s medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information, visit www.nih.gov.

Media Contacts

For information or to request an interview, contact Rebekah Yeager,  rebekah.yeager@nih.gov.

If you are not a member of the media, but have a general inquiry, please contact  NIHKidsandEnvironment@od.nih.gov.

Connect With Us

echo connectorCheck out the recent issues of our bi-monthly newsletter, the ECHO Connector, for program news and the latest research findings.

To receive the ECHO Connector through email, subscribe here.

Follow @ECHOChildHealth for the latest ECHO Program updates on X (formerly known as Twitter).

ECHO Researchers Find Link Between Phthalate Exposure and Preterm Birth, Estimate Potential Costs

Posted on by Jodi Snare

 

Collaborative ECHO research led by Leonardo Trasande, MD, MPP of NYU Langone Health investigates the potential connections between phthalates, their metabolites in the urine of pregnant individuals, and birth outcomes. This research, titled “Prenatal phthalate exposure and adverse birth outcomes in the USA: a prospective analysis of births and estimates of attributable burden and costs,” is published in The Lancet Planetary Health.

Phthalates are widely used chemicals found in some consumer products, and previous research has linked phthalate exposure to preterm birth. In response, the use of di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP), a common type of phthalate, has decreased in recent years. However, there is limited research on the effects of the replacement phthalates, and the costs associated with phthalate exposure remain unquantified.

The study included 5,006 mother-child pairs from 13 ECHO Cohort Study Sites across the U.S.  Researchers analyzed levels of 20 phthalate metabolites in urine samples collected at three different points during each participant’s pregnancy. Then, the team looked for associations between these metabolite levels and preterm birth. The team also investigated the differences between specific types of phthalates, comparing di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate (DEHP), a common type of phthalate, with several newer alternatives developed to replace it.

When the researchers grouped mothers based on the amount of DEHP metabolites (substances produced when the body breaks down DEHP) found in their urine, they found that the 10% with the highest levels had a 50% higher chance of giving birth before the 37th week of pregnancy compared to the 10% with the lowest levels.

Some common alternatives to DEHP were associated with an even higher risk of preterm birth. Women exposed to the highest amounts of these alternative chemicals—phthalic acid, di-isodecyl phthalate (DIDP), di-n-octyl phthalate (DnOP), and diisononyl phthalate (DiNP)—had twice the risk of preterm birth compared to those with little to no exposure to these alternatives. The team also calculated the costs associated with phthalate exposure.

“The number of premature births in the U.S. that could be linked to phthalate exposure in 2018 was between 24,000 and 120,000, potentially costing between $1.6 billion and $8.1 billion in medical expenses over the lifetime of the children,” Dr. Trasande said.

Future research could look at how exposure to replacement phthalates affects child development after birth. The European Union has prohibited the use of certain phthalates in some consumer products—as have California and a few other U.S. states.

Read the research summary here.

New ECHO Research Highlights Gaps in Literature Studying Role of Fathers in Child Development

Posted on by Jodi Snare

Collaborative ECHO research led by Elena Jansen, PhD of Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and Kristine Marceau, PhD of the College of Health and Human Sciences at Purdue University reviewed existing literature on what is known about a father’s role in child development, highlighting how a father’s history and personal characteristics can influence their child’s health and wellbeing. This research, titled “The Role of Fathers in Child Development from Preconception to Postnatal Influences: Opportunities for the National Institutes of Health Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program,” is published in Developmental Psychobiology.

While few studies on parental health and child development include fathers in any substantial way, a growing body of literature emphasizes their vital role—even before birth. This literature review studied existing research on the role of fathers in child development. It evaluated the quality of this research, focusing on three outcome areas of the ECHO Program: obesity, neurodevelopment, and positive health. The review also discussed how the ECHO Program can address gaps in the literature by designing studies that address unanswered questions.

The review first described data collected by the ECHO Cohort and identified critical gaps in the research related to the role of fathers in ECHO’s five key health outcome areas. After understanding the program’s data collection methods, the research team analyzed multiple research papers categorized into three broad stages of child development—preconception, prenatal, and postnatal.

This review focused on which previously studied characteristics or behaviors of fathers have been connected to children’s development. It demonstrated how studying the effect of fathers on child development has revealed additional insights into children’s health outcomes, including reasons for declines in physical or mental health. Compared to the pregnancy and pre-pregnancy stages, this study allowed researchers to better understand a father’s role once a baby is born.

“One unique aspect of this work is describing how fathers can impact the child by first influencing the mother, for example, by helping her follow healthy behaviors, such as cooking or helping to cook healthy meals and eating healthy food himself,” Dr. Jansen said.

This literature review also revealed gaps in the research community’s understanding of the father’s role in child development, highlighting the need to incorporate maternal and paternal reported data on fathers’ characteristics. While many studies offer insights into the role of fathers, often fathers do not provide this information themselves, or existing data do not allow researchers to compare the roles of fathers and mothers.

Additionally, the study team proposed a new conceptual model to guide future inquiry considering paternal influences, and suggest methods researchers can use to help fill in some knowledge gaps.

“Our model can help guide other researchers to focus on the pieces of the puzzle that we currently know very little about,” Dr. Jansen said. “It may help explain how each parent interacts with their child and which influence has a stronger impact or is more prevalent for which parent.”

With more data becoming available from the ECHO Program, information on fathers’ characteristics can be connected to the rich data on family characteristics, mothers’ influences, and child development. Additional data will be gathered to provide further insights and answer remaining questions.

Read the research summary.