Parental Love is the key to Brain Development in Children

If each child has a mental illness, from depression, schizophrenia to autism then one to blame is the role of the mother is lacking. But later revealed parental love is the key to brain development in children.

Although actually, besides the role of parents in assisting the development of children, genetic factors also cause chemical imbalances in the brain.

Over the last decade a series of scientific discoveries have shown that biological factors at least equal portions with environmental factors and genetic factors in influencing the mental illness in children. Single environmental factor most strongly is the love that children receive from parents.

This is a review of many studies have been conducted on mental illness in children. In a new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows how the role of parents not only change the hearts and minds, but also the child's brain.

The study was conducted by researchers at Washington University in St. Louis, involving 92 children aged 3-6 years. The study looked at the role of parents in helping their children deal with a rather stressful task that was designed to resemble the stress in daily life.

Several years later, the average child has an area the size of the brain called the hippocampus as measured using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Observations in this study was done by considering the various factors that can affect the size of the hippocampus.

The researchers found that mothers of children with a better role in helping children cope with everyday stress, have a significantly larger hippocampus. Children who have a small hippocampus were at increased risk for problems of depression and posttraumatic stress disorder in Alzheimer's disease.

"If in a state of depression, as well as having a small hippocampus could predict that it will not respond to antidepressants compared with those who have a large hippocampus. Having a small hippocampus increases the risk for all kinds of mental disorders'" said Dr. Charles Raison, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Arizona, Tucson as reported from CNNHealthNews, Tuesday (13/03/2012).

It also applies to smoking as in children with drug abuse due to lack of parental attention. In addition to protecting against brain diseases, the volume of the hippocampus is also very necessary because it is a brain region that plays a major role in managing the stress and pressures of everyday life.

The hippocampus is essential for the ability to establish and keep personal memories. It is also a major problem for the stress response and inflammatory response. Both of these can cause significant damage to the organs of the body and brain if not managed properly.

So that the expression of parental love as strong as the genes and chemicals that carry the tendency for mental disorders in children. The human brain is very complex, so that any outcome of brain function is affected not only by a single factor. But that process is a combination of factors of genes, chemicals and the environment.