Developmental abilities of children exposed to polybrominated biphenyls (PBB).

To investigate whether ingestion of polybrominated biphenyls has an adverse effect on the neuropsychological development of young children exposed in utero and in infancy, five tests of the McCarthy Scales of Children's Abilities were administered to a group of 19 PBB-exposed Michigan children. When the data for the exposed group were analyzed according to body burden of PBB as determined by fat biopsy, correlations ranging from -.5228 to -.3004 were found between the natural logarithms of the children's fat PBB values and their standardized scores on the developmental scales. Four of the five correlations were significant at p less than .05. Multivariate analysis of covariance confirmed the existence of a significant main effect for fat PBB level, with parental education held constant. Children with higher body burdens of PBB (greater than .100 ppm) scored significantly lower than exposed children with lower body burdens on the same four tests, and on a composite score representing overall performance. These results suggest the existence of an inverse relationship between body levels of PBB and some developmental abilities in young children.