BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article
Front. Pediatr.
Sec. Children and Health
This article is part of the Research TopicLongitudinal Data Analysis in Child and Adolescent Mental Health, volume IIView all 9 articles
Multilevel determinants of child development in socially vulnerable Brazilian children: A longitudinal study
Provisionally accepted
- 1Instituto Federal de Educacao Ciencia e Tecnologia de Goias, Goiânia, Brazil
- 2Universidade Federal de Goias Faculdade de Enfermagem, Goiânia, Brazil
- 3Universidade Federal de Goias Instituto de Patologia Tropical e Saude Publica, Goiânia, Brazil
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Child development consists of a process that involves multiple factors interrelated to the acquisition of children's skills in different areas, such as language, motor, cognitive, emotional, and social. Although extensively explored in literature, there is a gap in how vulnerabilities faced by families can influence this outcome. Thus, this study aims to identify social, maternal, obstetric and familiar determinants of child development in vulnerable children. This is a longitudinal study, conducted in three evaluations between August 2018 and January 2022, with families from Central Brazil participating in the research Impact Evaluation of the Happy Child Program. Generalized Estimating Equations models were used to identify the determinants of child development, evaluated in this study by the Ages and Stages Questionnaire 3rd edition, comparing with sociodemographic, social support, obstetric, children's birth and growth, and family situation variables. Of the 320 families that participated in the study in the state of Goiás, 284 met the inclusion criteria. In general, at the 3 assessment times, the children presented good child development scores in all domains. Positive determinants of child development included growth monitoring and non-violent discipline, while negative determinants were maternal age between 30 and 39 years old and psychological aggression. The findings of the present study highlight critical areas for targeted interventions in child development, offering valuable insights into research and policy formulation for children living in vulnerability situations.
Keywords: Child, Child Development, Vulnerable Populations, Primary Health Care, longitudinal analysis
Received: 29 Jul 2025; Accepted: 19 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 da Silva, Oliveira Silva and de Souza. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
George Oliveira Silva
Marta Rovery de Souza
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