Deepening Connections between Neuroscience and Public Policy to Understand Poverty

Recent studies have begun to show that inhibited brain development and functioning in children raised in poverty may be an important explanatory factor behind the relationship often seen between growing up in poverty and lower educational attainment. This brief from the Institute for Research on Poverty summarizes an April 2016 workshop, hosted by the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where researchers in the area of poverty and developmental neuroscience discussed the current status of the research and how it can be appropriately and effectively used to inform public policy.