NUTRITION AND LEARNING

Observations on animals and human infants suggest that malnutrition during a critical period of early life results in short stature and may, in addition, permanently and profoundly affect the future intellectual and emotional development of the individual. In humans, it is not known whether these results may be caused by malnutrition alone or whether such intimately related factors as infection and an inadequate social and emotional environment contribute significantly to the problem. Field studies to test these hypotheses are, at best, difficult to design and to carry out; it seems likely that it will prove impossible to separate clearly the individual effects of malnutrition, infection, and social environment. While progress has been made in understanding the biochemical development of nervous tissue, little is known of the effects of nutrition on the physiological processes of these organs, nor is there adequate information on the relation between mentation and cellular metabolism.