Assignment: Application Of Cross-Cultural Psychology

Low Birth Weight and Preterm Infants Three related conditions pose threats to many newborns: low birth weight, preterm birth, and being small for date. Low birth weight infants weigh less than 5 pounds at birth. Very low birth weight newborns weigh under 3 pounds, and extremely low birth weight newborns weigh under 2 pounds. Preterm infants are born three weeks or more before the pregnancy has reached its full term—in other words, 35 or fewer weeks after conception. Small for date infants (also called small for gestational age infants) have a birth weight that is below normal when the length of the pregnancy is considered. They weigh less than 90 percent of all babies of the same gestational age. Small for date infants may be preterm or full term. One study found that small for date infants have a 400 percent greater risk of death (Regev & others, 2003). In 2013, 11.4 percent of U.S. infants were born preterm—a 34 percent increase since the 1980s but a decrease of 1.4 percent since 2008 (Martin & others, 2015). The increase in preterm birth is likely due to such factors as the increasing number of births to women 35 years and older, increasing rates of multiple births, increased management of maternal and fetal conditions (for example, inducing labor preterm if medical technology indicates it will increase the likelihood of survival), increased substance abuse (tobacco, alcohol), and increased stress (Goldenberg & Culhane, 2007). Ethnic

variations characterize preterm birth (Raglan & others, 2016; Sorbye, Wanigaratne, & Urgula, 2016). For example, in 2013, the likelihood of being born preterm was 11.4 percent for all U.S. infants and 10.4 percent for non-Latino White infants, but the rate was 16.8 percent for African American infants and 11.7 for Latino infants (Martin & others, 2015).

Incidence and Causes of Low Birth Weight Most, but not all, preterm babies are also low birth weight babies. The incidence of low birth weight varies considerably from country to country. In some countries, such as India and Sudan, where poverty is rampant and the health and nutrition of mothers are poor, the percentage of low birth weight babies reaches as high as 31 percent. In the United States, there has been an increase in low birth weight infants in the last two decades, and the U.S. low birth weight rate of 8.02 percent in 2013 was considerably higher than that of many other developed countries (Martin & others, 2015). For example, only 4 percent of the infants born in Sweden, Finland, Norway, and Korea are low birth weight, and only 5 percent of those born in New Zealand, Australia, and France are low birth weight.