A new study has found that mean IQ scores of young children born during the pandemic have tumbled by as much as 22 points while verbal, motor and cognitive performance have all suffered as a result of lockdown.
“With limited stimulation at home and less interaction with the world outside, pandemic-era children appear to have scored shockingly low on tests designed to assess cognitive development,” reports the Guardian.
The Guardian reported on this study
The study was conducted by researchers at Brown University and included 672 children born both before and after the pandemic began in March 2020.
“In the decade preceding the pandemic, the mean IQ score on standardized tests for children aged between three months and three years of age hovered around 100, but for children born during the pandemic that number tumbled to 78,” the study found.
Researchers concluded that the primary reason for the impairment on cognitive functioning was lack of stimulation and interaction at home.
According to lead study author Sean Deoni, “The ability to course-correct becomes smaller, the older that child gets,” meaning that this inferior foundation is likely to impact the child throughout adolescence and into adulthood.
The study was conducted in the state of Rhode Island and included predominantly white children.
The fate of poorer children from less affluent socio-economic backgrounds, most of whom will be non-white, is likely to be significantly worse.
