A significant percentage of Mexican-American children who matched their white counterparts in cognitive growth at 9 months old had fallen behind by the time they reached age 2, according to a study from the University of California, Berkeley.
For the study, published in the May issue of the Hispanic Journal of Behavioral Sciences, lead author Bruce Fuller, a professor of education and public policy, tracked the development of about 950 Mexican-American children and 3,600 children of native-born white mothers.
About half of white toddlers showed strong cognitive growth by age 2, compared with 22 percent of Mexican-American toddlers. A quarter of Mexican-American and white youngsters had poor cognitive growth. Other research has found that based on such measures as social and emotional growth and physical health, young Mexican-American children are similar to white children.
