Understanding Racism's Impact on Child Development: Working Towards Fairness of Place in the United States

Contents

Podcast

Additional Resources

Transcript

In December 2023, we continued our Place Matters webinar series with our second installment: “Understanding Racism’s Impact on Child Development: Working Towards Fairness of Place in the United States.” During the webinar, Stephanie Curenton, PhD, Nathaniel Harnett, PhD, Mavis Sanders, PhD, and Natalie Slopen, ScD, discussed their latest research, exploring how racism gets “under the skin” to impact children’s development and how it contributes to unequal access to opportunity in the places where children live, grow, play, and learn. Together, they explored ways to dismantle systemic barriers and work toward solutions that promote healthy child development. The webinar discussion has been adapted for this episode of the Brain Architects podcast. 

Additional Resources

Place Matters: The Environment We Create Shapes the Foundations of Healthy Development

Moving Upstream: Confronting Racism to Open Up Children’s Potential

Priorities for Child Trends’ Applied Research Agenda on Black Children and Families - Child Trends

A Bibliographic Tool on Protective Community Resources for Children and Youth - Child Trends

Black Children and Youth Can Benefit From Focused Research on Protective Community Resources - Child Trends

Black Adolescents Are More Likely to Flourish in Neighborhoods Featuring Four Key Amenities - Child Trends

Transcript

Cameron Seymour-Hawkins: Welcome to The Brain Architects, a podcast from the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University. I’m Cameron Seymour-Hawkins, the Center’s Communications Coordinator.Our Center believes that advances in the science of child development provide a powerful source of new ideas that can improve outcomes for children and their caregivers. By sharing the latest science from the field, we hope to help you make that science actionable and apply it in your work in ways that can increase your impact.

In December, we continued our Place Matters webinar series with our second installment: “Understanding Racism’s Impact on Child Development: Working Towards Fairness of Place in the United States.” During the webinar, Doctors Stephanie Curenton, Nathaniel Harnett, Mavis Sanders, and Natalie Slopen, discussed their latest research, exploring how racism gets “under the skin” to impact children’s development and how it contributes to unequal access to opportunity in the places where children live, grow, play, and learn. Together, they explored ways to dismantle systemic barriers and work toward solutions that promote healthy child development. We’re excited to share this conversation on today’s episode of the Brain Architects podcast.

Now, without further ado, here’s Tassy Warren, the Center’s Deputy Director and Chief Strategy Officer, who will set the stage for our conversation.

Tassy Warren: Hello. Welcome to today's webinar. Understanding Racism's Impact on Child Development. Working towards fairness of place in the United States. We're so excited to bring you into this conversation. Whether you're joining us for the first time or are a regular to the Center on the Developing Child, thank you for being here today. This webinar is part of our Place Matters Webinar series. The series is designed to expand upon our Center's recent work on how influences from our environments, particularly the built in natural environments, play a role in shaping early childhood development beginning before birth. Throughout this series, we're highlighting scientific and community expertise and offering strategies to work towards fairness of place and to create the conditions that will allow all children to thrive.