How Childhood Stress Can Enhance or Hinder Brain Development
“It’s easier to build strong children than to repair broken men”
— Frederick Douglass 1817–1895
The lifelong impact of the way in which experiences in childhood impact an individual is fascinating to me. These experiences combined with a variety of factors, such as genetics, relationships, temperament, and environment have a profound impact on the adults that we become. Take stress for example:
Everyone experiences stress, including infants and children. Stress can be a healthy and natural part of learning and growth. In mild forms, it can teach an individual how to overcome difficulty or learn a new skill. Development in itself is stress — taking the risk to stand up, or jump, or trying something difficult — all of this creates new connections in the brain and understanding in the body. This is often accompanied by mild increases in heart rate and stress hormones. Even more difficult and stressful situations which cause stress can be manageable, if they are short term and/or include support from important caregivers.
However, many children experience what has been termed “Toxic Stress”. This is a result of “stressful events which are chronic, uncontrollable and /or experienced without the child having access to support from caring adults” [1]. It is called toxic stress because it can literally poison the child’s brain from stress hormones (cortisol). This poisoning can lead to structural changes in the stress response system, including the amygdala, hippocampus, prefrontal cortex and the overall brain structure. These changes can lead to hyper-reactivity or chronic activation of the stress response system, with decreased ability to turn off the stress response system.
All of that is the scientific and biological way of saying that stress literally gets wired into a child’s brain and body which impacts how they react to stress in the future.
This can have grave consequences. For example, studies such as the ACE Study have found that child who experience many “adverse childhood experiences” are much more likely to experience a wide range of negative health and wellness outcomes throughout life. This includes things like heart disease, depression, drug use, STIs, smoking, suicide, adolescent pregnancy, and liver disease.
In this way, early childhood discussions have a place in larger discussions of health promotion and government expenditures. The impact of early childhood experiences expand far beyond the realm of the first five years:
“When exposures occur during sensitive periods of development, their effects can become permanently incorporated into regulatory physiological processes, and subsequent adult disease may be viewed as the latent outcome of critical events that occurred during early periods of special susceptibility” [2].
One major piece of this puzzle is the absence of protective relationships to buffer this stress. This speaks to the importance of empowering and supporting parents and caregivers to be able to respond and protect their children during these experiences. This also means recognizing that parents need support too, through an extended network of other individuals, community supports, child care workers, home visitors, neighbours or whoever else can be a strong, reliable support system in crisis.
The old adage that it takes a village is still true today. Children need a collection of individuals who love and care for them, but that are also able to be a support network which responds effectively to their needs during difficult life experiences. These people can literally be the difference between tolerable and toxic stress; the difference between negative lifelong consequences or strength and resilience in the face of adversity. These relationships literally protect the brain from being poisoned and reshaped by stressful situations.
Obviously, we want to eliminate some of the things which can cause toxic stress, like child abuse; however, many of these things cannot be prevented, such as the death of a parent or divorce.
So what can you do? Understand what it looks like to support a child and be that. It is as simple (and as difficult) as being consistent and responsive to your child’s needs. When they cry, they need support and not tough-love as some would lead you to believe. When children struggle with big emotions, they learn how to manage those emotions through the support of another. They don’t just learn the practices of calming themselves and overcoming, their body and brain physically wires this into them. Your comfort is shaping their future ability to comfort themselves and overcome difficulty.
Sometimes in crisis, parents cannot be that person, especially if they are also impacted by the stressful situation. That is okay! Reaching out for support from others is equally important and can be powerful. It is hard to always be the strong and composed one, and sometimes the strongest thing you can do is ask for help.
No matter what your role is in a child’s life, your consistently supportive response can literally change their future outcome. You have a huge role in buffering stressful situations and the way in which this stress is wired into a child’s brain and body. Everyone has a role to play — neighbours, teachers, parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, coaches, mentors, humans. We have created enough “broken men”, let’s all do our part in helping to build the next generation of strong children.
[1] National Scientific Council on the Developing Child (2005). Excessive Stress Disrupts the Architecture of the Developing Brain.
[2] Shonkoff, JP, Boyce, WT & McEwen, BS. (2009) “Neuroscience, Molecular Biology, and the Childhood Roots of Health Disparities: Building a New Framework for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention” JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association 301 (21): 2252–2257. Doi: 10–10001/jama.2009.754.
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