Revisión de la neuropsicología del maltrato infantil: la neurobiología y el perfil neuropsicológico de las víctimas de abusos en la infancia

Abstract

Childhood is stage that is vulnerable to stressful situations, such as abuse. Childhood maltreatment is an adverse environmental factor that may disrupt the neurological development and determine child's brain maturation, leading to cognitive deficits persistent in adulthood. The profile of maltreated children profile features problems in attention, memory, language, and intellectual development, school failure, and high prevalence of internalizing and externalizing problems. Disruptions in neurogenesis, myelinization, synaptogenesis, and neuronal pruning processes, as well as subsequent damage in hippocampus, amygdala, cerebellum, hypothalamus, and cerebral cortex, are the neurobiological physiopathological basis of the said cognitive profile.