Breastfeeding makes for more intelligent children

May 6 2008

While it has been recognised for decades that breastfeeding is better for both mothers and babies, scientists are now suggesting that it also benefits a child's intelligence.

In one of the most comprehensive studies conducted to date on breast feeding, the researchers say breastfed babies are more intelligent.

In a study involving 14,000 children living in Belarus who were monitored from birth to over six years, it was found that breastfed babies were more intelligent than those weaned on formula milk.

The findings which were based on IQ and academic ratings at age six, show that those who were breastfed performed significantly better in IQ tests.

The researchers found that by age six and a half, children who had been exclusively breastfed scored 7.5 points higher in verbal intelligence tests and 5.9 points higher in overall IQ tests - this was supported by their teachers who found that the breastfed children rated higher at reading, writing and solving mathematical problems.

Earlier research had reached the same conclusion but it raises the issue as to whether it is breast milk itself or the associated maternal care that is responsible for boosting the intelligence of developing babies and such an effect will be difficult to prove.

The problem lies with the fact that almost every study carried out to date has involved mothers deciding beforehand whether or not they plan to breastfeed and this then raises the possibility that breastfeeding women were simply brighter, or were likely to interact more with their children.

This latest study by researchers at McGill University in Montreal looked at children born at 31 maternity hospitals and clinics across Belarus between 1996 and 1997.

Professor Michael Kramer and his colleagues avoided the problems faced by earlier studies by randomly assigning half of the hospitals to adopt a breastfeeding promotion programme, while the rest acted as a control group and continued to offer their usual post-natal advice.

The doctors interviewed 13,889 of the children and their mothers between 2002-05, half of whom had attended clinics promoting breastfeeding.

Of mothers those mothers who visited clinics that advocated breastfeeding, 43% fed their babies only on breast milk until the age of three months, compared with 6.4% of women at the control clinics.

Professor Kramer says the study provides the strongest evidence to date that prolonged and exclusive breastfeeding makes children more intelligent.

However why or how breastfeeding boosts intelligence is a moot point - is it the due to some constituent of breast milk, or related to the physical and social interactions inherent in breastfeeding?

Experts say breast milk contains essential long-chain fatty acids and a chemical called insulin-like growth factor, which might be responsible for boosting intelligence.

The research is published in the Archives of General Psychiatry.