Lead-based Paint Could Cause Criminal Behavior
Lead exposure in early childhood could be linked to brain damage and even an increased risk of criminal behavior as an adult, according to two new studies.
Kim Dietrich of the University of Cincinnati in Ohio, who led one of the studies in the Public Library of Science journal PLoS Medicine.
Researchers say their findings represent the first evidence of a direct link between prenatal and early-childhood lead exposure and criminal behavior later in life.
“Previous studies either relied on indirect measures of exposure or failed to follow subjects into adulthood to examine the relationship between lead exposure and criminal activity in young adults,” explains Dietrich, a professor of environmental health at UC.
“We have monitored this specific sub-segment of children who were exposed to lead both in the womb and as young children for nearly 30 years,” he said. “We have a complete record of the neurological, behavioral and developmental patterns to draw a clear association between early-life exposure to lead and adult criminal activity.”
Researchers say their findings could point to the increase of crimes in inner-city areas, where older houses could still have lead paint.
Dietrich and colleagues studied pregnant women living in Cincinnati neighborhoods ridden with lead-contaminated housing between 1979 and 1984. They tested the women and then their children from birth and have been watching the children as they grew up.
They correlated blood-lead level data from 250 of the children to criminal arrest records.
About 55 percent of the now-grown children had at least one arrest, 28 percent involving drugs and 27 percent serious motor vehicle violations.
"Lower income, inner-city children remain particularly vulnerable to lead exposure," Dietrich said.
"Although we’ve made great strides in reducing lead exposure, our findings send a clear message that further reduction of childhood lead exposure may be an important and achievable way to reduce violent crime.”
After conducting MRI scans of the brains of volunteers, Dr. Kim Cecil of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center found that more than 1 percent of total gray matter in the brain was missing.
"The most affected regions included frontal gray matter, specifically the anterior cingulate cortex," Cecil’s team wrote in a second study. This region is responsible for mood regulation and decision-making.
Men were far more affected than women.
"Our findings also suggest that this structural change is permanent," researchers wrote.
Study coauthor John Wright, PhD, a member of UC’s criminal justice faculty who studies the impact of factors like genetics, psychology and biology on criminality, says he had limited expectations for how strong a correlation between lead exposure and criminality could be established.
“I did not expect we would see an effect, much less a substantive effect and even less likely a highly resilient effect,” says Wright.
“The fact that we are able to detect the effects from childhood exposures now into adulthood stands as a testament of lead’s power to influence behavior over a long period of time.”
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