The HEALthy Brain and Child Development Study
The HEALthy Brain and Child Development (HBCD) Study is one of the largest and most ambitious longitudinal investigations of early brain and child development in the United States. Funded through the NIH HEAL Initiative and a partnership across multiple NIH institutes, HBCD will follow more than 7,000 families from pregnancy through early childhood across 25 research sites nationwide to understand how biological, environmental, and social factors interact to shape neural, cognitive, behavioral, and emotional development.
At Oklahoma State University, we are proud to serve as one of these national sites, working collaboratively to recruit participants and contribute to study planning, implementation, and dissemination of findings. Our team’s work includes feasibility research on engaging pregnant people and new parents (with and without substance use histories) in services and supports. This study is critical for understanding how access to care affects early development.
HBCD’s comprehensive protocol integrates neuroimaging, biospecimens, developmental assessments, and detailed environmental and behavioral measures to chart children’s development from prenatal stages into early childhood. This multi‑modal design allows researchers to examine how prenatal exposures (including substance use), stress, adversity, family context, and broader social environments influence developmental trajectories.
Our site also contributes to consortium‑wide scientific advances, including research on biospecimen collection protocols that support investigations of genetic, epigenetic, and metabolic pathways linking early exposures to outcomes. work published collaboratively with HBCD investigators that informs study implementation and future analyses.
