Poverty and the Brain: The New/Old Language of Cultural Deficit

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Bibliographic Details
Title: Poverty and the Brain: The New/Old Language of Cultural Deficit
Language: English
Authors: Christopher Hu (ORCID 0000-0001-9778-1277), Diane M. Hoffman (ORCID 0000-0001-6669-2415)
Source: Educational Researcher. 2025 54(9):540-545.
Availability: SAGE Publications. 2455 Teller Road, Thousand Oaks, CA 91320. Tel: 800-818-7243; Tel: 805-499-9774; Fax: 800-583-2665; e-mail: journals@sagepub.com; Web site: https://sagepub.com
Peer Reviewed: Y
Page Count: 6
Publication Date: 2025
Document Type: Journal Articles
Reports - Evaluative
Descriptors: Poverty, Brain, Child Development, Cognitive Development, Cultural Influences, Family Environment, Neurosciences, Scientific Research, Parent Child Relationship, Child Rearing, Anthropology, Language Acquisition
DOI: 10.3102/0013189X251349155
ISSN: 0013-189X
1935-102X
Abstract: In this essay, we consider recent narratives in the science of brain development under poverty in relation to the older idea of the culture of poverty. We argue that in theorizing poor parenting and deficient linguistic stimulation as the primary pathways of influence through which poverty exerts its damaging effects on the brain, brain science builds on and offers new evidence for the supposed cultural deficits of those in poverty even as anthropological evidence from studies of learning under poverty challenges the deficit narrative. Brain development science has further catalyzed global iterations of the culture of poverty that obscure not only the material and structural forces that make poverty salient but also the sociocultural situatedness of learning and development.
Abstractor: As Provided
Entry Date: 2025
Accession Number: EJ1490892
Database: ERIC
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