- We have this general understanding in pediatrics

that children living in very threatening environments

are at greater risk for health problems

but we've had no way to screen for that.

And we're close to being able to screen for that.

- There, you see that?

- [Brunette Woman] Yeah.

- She really wants to walk.

- We will have measures to be able to differentiate

children who seem to be more sensitive to adversity,

and therefore need more attention,

and at the same time this will be a measure of resilience

because there are a lot of children

living in very tough environments

who are doing well and whose parents

are doing a magnificent job. That's the big breakthrough.

It's being able to measure this at an individual level.

- There she is.

- Simple EEG, a measurement

of electrical activity in the brain,

put a little cap on a child's head,

a couple of minutes you get an EEG tracing.

It will tell you about the electrical activity in the brain,

which in cases of stress can also be decreased.

- [Brunette Woman] Hi, Mimi. (laughter)

It's all good! You look really good!

Yeah.

- All right. So we're interested in understanding

how babies react to the different experiences

that they have, and one way we do this is

by recording her brain activity

by wearing this special hat,

and then while she's wearing it she'll watch a movie

and we'll get to see what's going on in her brain.

(tinkering music)

- [Blonde Woman] Nice job.

- This is bringing 21st century neuroscience

into the community setting in a pediatric office

where people can interpret this and it's a whole new world.

There's science of excessive stress effects

and we can measure these in simple ways.

We can look at stress hormones like cortisol.

These are things that you can collect in urine,

you can collect them in saliva.

So they'll be very simple to do

in a community-based setting.

- If this becomes standard of care in pediatricians' offices

they have perhaps one of the most powerful tools ever

to identify children at risk

for exposure to excessive stress

to know whether or not children are living

in excessively stressful circumstances

and to measure whether or not they're getting better

from the interventions that we provide.