Germany: Raising children is not an easy task and now it has been revealed that if children are subjected to too much strictness, their DNA is affected, which can cause them to suffer from depression in childhood and adolescence.
Thus, strictness and scolding by parents causes epigenetic changes in them and biologically increases the risk of mental stress and depression in them. However, its effects begin to appear in puberty. To eliminate its negative effect, it is important to train children with a sense of security and love so that their personalities can be balanced.
This research has now been done by Prof. Evelyn von Esche of the University of Munster in Germany, who was affiliated with the University of Leuven in Belgium at the time of the research. Details were presented at the European College of Neuropsychology Pharmacology conference. She says that hitting and yelling at children can affect the natural process of gene expression and thus affect the overall development of the child.
Although the study included very few individuals, its statistical significance is there. It involved 21 teenage boys and girls who were raised by their parents in an ideal environment and gently trained. They were then compared to 23 boys and girls who were the same age and who had experienced parental beating, harshness, and neglect in childhood. Their average age was between 12 and 16 years.
The experts then analyzed the DNA of all the involved individuals, in which methylation was evaluated at 450,000 locations in the DNA. Methylation is a natural process in which small fragments of chemical compounds attach to DNA and affect its instructions. If this process increases, a person can suffer from depression.
Now, the children who were raised in the harshest environment had a higher rate of mutation in their DNA and after the analysis, signs of this were also seen in their psyche.