Noipayak et al. BMC Pediatrics (2016) 16:87 DOI 10.1186/s12887-016-0624-8 RESEARCH ARTICLE Open Access Age at menarche and performance intelligence quotients of adolescents in Bangkok, Thailand: a cross-sectional study Pongsak Noipayak1*, Petch Rawdaree2, Busaba Supawattanabodee3 and Sumonmal Manusirivitthaya3 Abstract Background: The presence of an association between age at the onset of puberty and intelligence quotient (IQ) in young adolescents remains controversial. The aim of this study was to explore the association between age at menarche and performance IQ scores of young female adolescents in Bangkok, Thailand. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 537 students aged 11–15 years attending primary and secondary schools in the Dusit district of Bangkok, Thailand. The participants were selected based on two-step stratified sampling. Age at menarche and health and socioeconomic status were determined using a self-report questionnaire completed by participants. Performance IQ scores were determined using the Standard Progressive Matrices intelligence test (Thai version) administered by registered clinical psychologists. Results: Of the 537 participants, 0.4 had reached menarche at 8 years of age, 1.9 at 9 years, 10.1 at 10 years, 36.1 at 11 years, 37.6 at 12 years, 10.4 at 13 years, 3.4 at 14 years, and 0.2 % at 15 years. Age at menarche was inversely correlated with performance IQ (Pearson correlation −0.087, p = 0.047). The regression equation predicting performance IQ by age at menarche was performance IQ = 128.06 − 1.16*age at menarche (R2 = 0.008). In univariate analysis, performance IQ was inversely correlated with age at menarche, body mass index (BMI), time spent watching television, and time sleeping, but was directly correlated with maternal age at birth (all p < 0.05). In multivariate analysis, age at menarche and BMI remained significantly inversely correlated with performance IQ (p < 0.05), while maternal age at birth was directly correlated with performance IQ. The model consisting of age at menarche, BMI, and maternal age at birth best predicted performance IQ. Conclusion: After adjusting for confounders, multiple regression analysis showed that age at menarche and BMI of young female adolescents living in the Dusit district of Bangkok, Thailand, were inversely correlated with performance IQ, whereas maternal age at birth was directly correlated with performance IQ. Keywords: Performance IQ, Bangkok, Menarche, Early puberty, Maternal age Background age at menarche had decreased by approximately 7 months The age at menarche has been decreasing worldwide over per decade since 1960 [3]. There have been two previous the last century. The secular trend is approximately studies on the mean age at menarche among different 2 months per decade in the United States and 2.5 months population groups in Thailand. In a 1987 study of female per decade in Europe [1]. Two surveys conducted in the adolescents living in Bangkok, the mean age at menarche United States revealed a decrease in age at menarche from was 12.15 years [4]. In a 1997 study of obese teenagers 12.8 years in 1963–1970 to 12.5 years in 1988–1994 [2]. living in rural areas of Thailand, the mean age at menar- In Asia, a study of adolescent Indian girls found that the che was 12.5 years [5]. Hormonal changes during adolescence, such as increases in androstenedione, and increases in dehydroepiandroster- * Correspondence: [email protected] 1Department of Pediatrics, Navamindradhiraj University, Vajira Hospital, one and its sulfate have been reported to be associated not Samsean Road, Dusit, Bangkok 10300, Thailand only with pubertal onset but also with the development and Full list of author information is available at the end of the article © 2016 The Author(s). Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. Noipayak et al. BMC Pediatrics (2016) 16:87 Page 2 of 5 function of the central nervous system [6]. However, reports (n =90)asbeingrequiredtoinvestigate the association of the association between early puberty and brain function, between age at menarche and IQ (correlation = 0.26) [9]. particularly intelligence quotient (IQ) around the time of A two-step sampling procedure was carried out to re- menarche, remain inconsistent. In 1983, a study comparing cruit participants. Two mixed-sex BMA schools, one the IQ of girls with early puberty and matched controls mixed-sex Ministry of Education school, one mixed-sex found that the girls with early puberty had poorer verbal teacher-training school, and two girls-only private schools skills but better spatial abilities than the controls [7]. In con- were sampled in the first step using simple random trast, the findings of a study published in 1984 reported that sampling according to the ratios of students. Next, to girls with early puberty had higher verbal IQ than control ensure convenient data collection for the whole Dusit subjects, but there was no difference in the performance IQ study project, students were sampled as clusters based on [8]. A study on performance IQ among adolescent girls in their classrooms. Written parental consent was obtained Iran found that performance IQ was inversely correlated for all students included after sample selection before the with age at menarche [9], and a Danish study reported in data collection, but participants with a history of illness 1986 found that while the long-term IQ of girls with early involving sex hormones (e.g., pituitary tumor, steroid puberty did not differ from that of control subjects, the administration), and those who were unable to read and/or spatial perception scores of girls with early puberty were writewereexcluded. lower [10]. A 2012 study of girls living in the United States compared the IQ of girls aroundthetimeofmenarcheand Data collection found that girls with early puberty had a lower IQ than con- Eight pediatricians validated the content of the self-report trols [11]. The inconsistent findings of previous studies questionnaire used in the study. After content validation make it difficult to draw a conclusion about any association (content validity ratio = 0.75–0.99), one question was between early puberty and IQ scores. The present study modified, and five questions about sexuality were deleted. aimed to explore the association between age at menarche The questionnaires were then sent to the study students and performance IQ scores of young female adolescents via the research coordinator teachers in each school, and living in the Dusit district of Bangkok, Thailand. were collected within 1 week. Students completed ques- tions on their age at menarche, health and socioeconomic status (such as their allowance), the amount of time spent Methods sleeping (sleeping time), the amount of time spent playing Study design and participants video games, the amount of time spent watching televi- This study was conducted as part of the Dusit study sion, and the amount of time spent reading any reading project, a cross-sectional study conducted between June material. If questionnaires were not returned within 3 days and December 2013. The project proposed to investigate of two telephone calls in the second week after distribu- the association between age at menarche and various tion, the participants were defined as non-responders. health and socioeconomic issues and demographic To ensure the reliability and validity of anthropometric factors among female students in grades 5–9 at schools measurements, weight and height were measured at in the Dusit district of Bangkok, Thailand. There were schools by a trained research nurse following the Centers 47 schools in Dusit, with a total of 17,045 female for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) standard [12], students. The schools were categorized into four groups and BMI was calculated using SPSS version 22 (IBM Corp., according to their affiliations with the Bangkok Armonk, NY, USA). Performance IQ scores were measured Metropolis (Bangkok Metropolitan Administration [BMA] by registered clinical psychologists using the Standard schools), the Office of the Basic Education Commission of Progressive Matrices intelligence test (Thai version), which Thailand (schools of the Ministry of Education), universities is a nonverbal intelligence test [13]. The reliability of the (teacher-training schools), and the Office of the Private Thai version of the Standard Progressive Matrices was Education Commission (private schools). There were no 0.946, as determined among Thai children and youths in Thai data available to calculate the sample size for the 2009 using the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-III present study. Therefore, the sample size was calculated as a gold standard [13]. The Research Ethics Committee at based on the mean age at menarche ± standard deviation the Faculty of Medicine Vajira Hospital, Navamindradhiraj (SD; 12.62 ± 1.05) for Indian girls as reported in 2009 [3]. A University (University of Bangkok Metropolis), Bangkok, minimum of 848 participants was required but the sample Thailand, approved this study on July 30, 2012. size was increased by 20 % to increase the power and to minimize the possibility of inadequate samples because of Statistical analyses non-responders. Finally, 1018 female students were in- An assistant researcher carried out verification for rele- cluded in the target population. This sample size exceeded vant factors included in the analysis, such as age at me- the number of participants calculated from a study in Iran narche, during data entry and data cleaning. Cases with Noipayak et al.