Early puberty linked to the poverty trap
Early puberty has been linked to physical, behavioural and mental health issues post-childhood and is more likely to strike disadvantaged children.
Early puberty is "profoundly" more likely to strike disadvantaged children than those from a wealthy home, new research has shown.
Professor Melissa Wake, an Auckland University paediatrician involved in the study, said major hormonal changes at a young age helped fuel the poverty cycle.
"Early puberty may be one of the ways in which social disadvantage gets under the skin and influences children's later life chances, both in terms of economic prosperity and health," she said.
She noted that the tie between poverty and early puberty was a relatively recent phenomenon; the opposite was observed in the 19th century.
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Back then a lack of food made poorer children hit puberty - which requires plenty of calories to kick off - later, said Wake.
"Now we live in societies where food excess is more of a problem than food insufficiency and we're seeing this complete flip - where the poorest children go through puberty first," she said.
Professor Melissa Wake says her study's findings highlight the importance of tackling the issues behind early puberty at a society-wide level.
Childhood obesity has also been linked to early puberty.
Wake's study followed 3700 Australian children from birth and found the boys from low socioeconomic backgrounds were more than four times as likely to start puberty before age 11 than their better-off counterparts. The risk of menstruation before age 11 doubled in girls from poorer homes.
At that age, around 20 per cent of all children in the study had started puberty.
Wake said the research's findings would also be applicable to New Zealanders.
Parents of children in the study were asked to report regularly on factors such as their child's skin changes, body hair growth, breast development, and the start of girls' periods.
Income and occupations determined a family's socioeconomic status; quality of housing - such as the presence of dampness or mould - was not taken into account.
Wake said that while she couldn't be sure what exactly linked a child's deprived background with their starting puberty early, she thought stress was a likely contender.
"Stress reprograms the brain," she said.
Her fellow researcher, Professor Ying Sun, said children facing hardship might be hormonally programmed to reproduce earlier to boost the chance of their genes passing on to the next generation.
This short-term evolutionary advantage could impact negatively on a child's future well-being, however, Wake noted.
She said early bloomers were more at risk of depression, heart disease, and reproductive tract cancers. Girls starting puberty young were more prone to "risky behaviour" like sleeping around, substance abuse and eating disorders, she added.
"Children from low socioeconomic backgrounds are profoundly more likely to start puberty early and it can lead to a lifelong cycle of poor health," she said.
"Findings like these highlight the importance of tackling these issues at a society-wide level."
The study was published in the medical journal Pediatrics on Wednesday. Wake is the Cure Kids professor of child health research at the University of Auckland.
- Stuff
