community health aides. The stunted children were compared with
normal middle-class children of the same age. The children were fol-
lowed for 24 months.
Both stimulation and nutrition improved development. Nutrition
and stimulation together led to the stunted children matching the
nonstunted groups’ development after 24 months. The researchers
concluded that stimulation and food supplementation had signifi-
cant independent beneficial effects on the children’s development.
This shows that nutrition, by itself, does not produce the same effect
as when it is accompanied by stimulation.
In this study, the researchers noted that the control group for the
study came from a poor neighborhood and did not show the same
development as a population of middle-class Jamaican children. At
this age, the children who were stimulated showed a gain in intelli-
gence quotient (IQ) and cognitive function, but this was less than the
IQ and cognitive levels for nonstunted middle-class children. The
children given only improved nutrition did not show a gain in cogni-
tion and IQ at ages 11–12 years.
There are a number of studies of ECD interventions in developing
countries that show improved early child development (Young 1997,
2002).Randomized Controlled Trials
The High/Scope Perry Preschool program in the United States found,
in a randomized trial, that a center program during the school year
for 3–4 year olds on weekday mornings along with a weekly 1.5 hour
home visit to each mother and child on weekday afternoons during
the school year had a significant effect on child development. Fifty-
eight of these children were randomized to the preschool program,
and 65 received no preschool program.
The children in the program significantly outperformed the no-
program group. (Sixty-five percent in the program graduated from
high school, in comparison with 45 percent of those not in the pro-
gram.) A higher proportion of the children in the program went on
Scientific Underpinnings of the Importance of ECD in a Global World 75