Breast feeding confers many benefits but making a child smarter is not one of them

Oct 4 2006

New research by Scottish scientists has found that whether a child is breastfed or not has no bearing on their intelligence.

Although some earlier research has suggested it raises a child's IQ, experts now argue it has no effect.

They all agree however that there are indeed great benefits to both mother and child from breastfeeding, but raising a child's intelligence levels is not one of them.

This latest study by the Medical Research Council and University of Edinburgh, found that mothers who breastfed tended on the whole to be more intelligent, better educated and to provide a more stimulating home environment.

They arrived at this conclusion after examining data from 5,475 children and 3,161 mothers in the United States, taken from the U.S. National Longitudinal Study of Youth 1979.

Lead researcher Geoff Der says the question has been debated ever since a link between high IQ and breastfeeding was first suggested in 1929.

But Der says, though breastfed children do tend to score higher on intelligence tests, they also tend to come from more advantaged backgrounds.

The researchers also looked at families where one child was breastfed and another was not and this confirmed the earlier results as the breastfed child was no more intelligent than his or her sibling.

Breastfed babies have been shown to be less prone to diarrhoea, vomiting, and respiratory infections and just one day of breastfeeding is thought to be enough to stabilise a baby's blood sugar levels, and provide natural antibodies against disease.

Experts say breastfeeding is the best form of nutrition for infants as the composition of breast milk meets the individual needs of each baby.

The World Health Organization recommends that babies should be breastfed for at least the first two years.