Children born to mothers with the condition hypothyroidism may have a harder time storing and recalling personal memories because the region of the brain responsible for these memories – the hippocampus – functions differently than in other children, according to a new study reported in Medscape Medical News.
Researchers at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Canada worked with 34 children between the ages of nine and 11. Fifteen of these children were born to mothers who had hypothyroidism – a condition where the body does not produce enough of the thyroid hormone – while the other children served as the control group.
The researchers used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to see how the brain reacted when the children were asked to recall certain details.
Compared to the control group, the children of mothers suffering from hypothyroidism used more of their hippocampus when trying to recount personal memories, and yet still did not have as good recall. The more severe their mothers’ hypothyroidism, the more the hippocampus worked to bring back the memories.
"Behaviorally, we found that the offspring of hypothyroid women provided less detail in their original autobiographic memories," explained study coauthor Dr. Joanne Rovet."When they recalled their own past, it was with less detail."
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