Child and Youth Studies

CHYS 3P24
Dr. J. McNamara
March 23, 2017

Final Exam
- Keep in word document
- due April 13th in CHYS 3P24 drop-box and on turnitin.com
- use 3ish references
- posted on Friday March 24
Early Child Development and Health
Developmental Health
- Take program and policy and see how nations support their kids and the
health of a nation- developmental health, how they develop and how they
develop in a healthy way
- Overall well-being of a child, captures how a social relationship can affect
your immune system- environmental things (social determinants of health)
how social things can determine your health
- Smoking is bad for a developing baby- there are lots of people who smoke
and the effects are not see on the baby- would you prefer someone to not
smoke and be super stressed during pregnancy (stress on mom stress on
fetus) or prefer the mom to smoke and not have stress since it alleviates it
- Population health- looks at what makes a nation healthy and unhealthy

The mismatch between research and policy in child development

- Shows where we invest our money as a nation in north America, the line is
brain malleability- how open a brain is to absorb new information- children
are very open to development because the malleability to their brain is most
open when they are young- there is a drop after age 10 and from a
relationship perspective is when we can most impact how a brain is going to
set up and the malleability later in life
- There is a lot we can do to set our children up for success including peer
relationships
- Government spending – per age group on education and welfare- they spend
a ton on seniors (this is only education and welfare)- they change this and
spend this amount of money on this age group because they can vote and

Developmental Health and the Wealth of Nations - Clyde Hertzman

 children cannot vote; our line is not flat is because of this and how they only
account for the older generations compared to the younger generations.
- Difference between low and high is what we are interested in and it is a
disparity- and is measured by the gradient effect

Social Determinants of Health

• The social and economic under which people live that determine their health
• SES
• Education
• Relationships
• Government
• Policies
• Etc.
- These go into the social determinant of health
Socio-Economic Status
• Social / Economic standing of an individual or group
• Measured by:
• Education
• Income
• Occupation

- Looked at low SES group, they had low life expectancy and high child
mortality rates- then they measured the high SES they’re health is very high
and they access doctors twice a week and have private health care (health
care costs in the states)
- Cuba’s high SES was not much different from the SES of the low SES
individuals they’re line is flat and they are the healthiest (health care system
linked to the notion of prevention)- Sweden- good health across the board
- The line is the measure of the population health and how they measure
population health- they population health of the united states is very low
because they’re gradient is very high
- Cuba’s poly-clinics get everything done at once – education fits in as well –
bullying 7% have been verbally bullied compared to the 27%, 4% say they
have been physically bullied compared to the American norm of 16%- they
have a world leading developmental health model
The Importance of SES
The Gradient Effect
• A strong and consistent association between socioeconomic status and a variety of
development and health outcomes throughout the life-course
- Those in low SES have poor outcomes, the ones in high SES have good
outcomes and we are interested in increasing the outcomes in the lower SES
and by increasing that we may have to decrease the high SES

Graphs related to the gradient effect and SES

Look at what is needed to become a healthy adult

Change in Cognitive Complexity of Jobs

A greater demand on our children

Threats to well being of children

Developmental Health and the Wealth of Nations - Clyde Hertzman
 The gradient effect and well being of children

• Children Living in Low-Functioning Families

• Children Hanging Around with Kids who Frequently Get into Trouble

• Children Living in Problem Neighbourhoods

• Children Living in Substandard Housing

• Children Living in Unsafe Neighbourhoods

• Children Not in Excellent Health

• Children Rarely Participating in Organized Sports

• Children with Delayed Vocabulary Development

- Income inequality vs. SES

- They are spending more on education and they don’t have that much
- North American is not doing a good job supporting the welfare of children
- Most concerned with the widening of the gap and how the SES has changed the
amounts of literacy that children are able to learn and retain
- Children living in low functioning families- where we see a dip was in families that
are in lower SES
- Bad neighborhoods are influenced by families who are under 40,000
- Not so concerned with the high SES and we are concerned with the people who are
at the lower end of the spectrum and we need to think at the lower end and level of
things- ex sports are a protective factor because they can do well socially,
academically and physically because there is nothing else to relate to because they
are doing everything- organized sports can be set up in poor communities since they
help all areas.
- Poor communities have access and it has to be set up in the community so that
they are able to make it since they may not have a car- if they have to take some
means of transportation they most likely won’t do it and access is the primary
foundations it needs to be built on embedded within the community- which is so
linked to the mental health of this group- all kids want to play sports and will pick it
over getting in trouble- type of program we need to be interested in since they
cannot afford the sports cost but they need to be involved in sports
So what do we do?

Recommendations to reduce the Gradient Effect?

- Reducing the gradient affect is what we are interested in doing and it is done
by generally we become a learning society and we act on the behalf of
healthy human development and we need to think about the ways that Cuba
runs through their learning society they have payed attention to it and
developed programming around it- supportive sciences is what pushes
Cuba’s programs.
-
A Learning Society
• Capable of organizing and acting on behalf of human development
Developmental Health and the Wealth of Nations - Clyde Hertzman
 - Pushes their policies through research and support

Supporting Families
-Looking at the caregiver leave policy in the US when they only have 6 weeks and
have a lower SES and must go back to work to make money but cannot afford care
which is expensive, since they must go back there is no vocabulary or talking to your
child where when you live in a place like Canada or Sweden then you would have a
whole year to be home with their children. Cycle effect
Educational Reform

High/Scope Perry Preschool Study

• 123 young African-American children, living in poverty and at risk of school failure
• Randomly assigned to initially similar program and no-program groups
• 4 teachers held daily classes of 20-25 three- and four-year-olds and made weekly home
visits
- they had one year of quality day care and then had a home visit and how they
have followed up with what they have learned at preschool- there was no
cost to the family; only difference between groups is that one group had a
year of preschool and not the rest and followed them until they were 27- they
all went together
- the economic effects at age 27 were very different between the groups that
were randomly assigned – well put together study and this was when they
were ¾ year olds and is at the peak of when the brain is more malleable
- most astounding was that the cost of the program was 12,356 per child and
this is how much savings at age 27, 716% return on your investment- long
term investment of growth down the road which is a problem and takes
some long-term thinking; which is the massive investment pay off- the
savings between the individual between the in group and not in the program
was $88,000
•

- Federal website that points to our best practices and how the resources and
the evidence based practices and best and promising practices along with
guiding principles based on programing and on empirical evidence which is
measured on impact “we want to build best practices built on evidence that

Developmental Health and the Wealth of Nations - Clyde Hertzman

 works”- social determinants of health, bullying etc.- Best practices portal on
the PREVnet.
Developmental Health
Key Messages
• We know about ECD research
• We know about the social determinants of health
• We know that inequities exist
• Policies on ECD much reflect research on ECD

Developmental Health and the Wealth of Nations - Clyde Hertzman