ABSTRACT
The thalidomide tragedy notwithstanding, in most instances, demonstrated links in humans between prenatal drug exposure and immediate physical, neurological, or later developmental and psychological outcomes are fraught with significant methodologic problems. This chapter focuses on the four drugs, namely, alcohol, heroin, marijuana, and cocaine, in human infants and young children with particular attention to relationships between prenatal exposure and effects on cognition and related processes. Children developing amid the violence, substance abuse, poverty, and discord increasingly common in inner-city neighborhoods are at risk for dysfunctional development on a number of accounts. Although specific syndromes such as that associated with maternal alcoholism during pregnancy have been clearly identified, controversy, and conflicting findings still pertain regarding long-term effects of any one of these agents on cognitive development and intellectual development. Suggestive findings, particularly with prenatal cocaine exposure, point to impairments in more basic neurodevelopmental domains of attention and arousal regulation, functions that underlie learning and information processing.
