Barry Bogin: Loughborough University & University of Michigan-Dearborn

The World Health Organization defines stunting as, “…impaired growth and development that children experience from poor nutrition, repeated infection, and inadequate psychosocial stimulation.” Most of the recent research literature equates stunting with malnutrition, less with infection, and rarely with psychosocial issues. In contrast, most of the historic literature indicates that growth in height is largely independent of the extent and nature of the diet. We are sceptical that the estimated global prevalence of 150 million stunted infants and children is due to under-feeding. Systematic reviews of modern nutrition interventions find no impact on linear growth. We hypothesise that the majority of stunted infants and children are suffering from the social-emotional stresses of poverty – stresses that antagonize skeletal growth hormones.