In her thesis, the dentist Anita Alm has linked caries in fifteen-year-olds to various factors in early childhood. In this longitudinal study the dental health of 568 children was followed from one to fifteen years of age. The results show that two out of every three fifteen-year-olds had caries.

The children’s parents completed a questionnaire on their own dental care and their social situation when the children were one year old. The results show that several psychosocial factors from early childhood have an impact on dental health in the longer term.

“Children of parents who, despite being called in for dental care, did not attend for examination when the children were one year old on average had twice the level of caries when they were fifteen compared with children who did attend for these examinations. One reason why the parents did not take their children along to be examined was that they themselves had dental anxiety or had a complicated social situation in which dental care was not given priority,” says Alm.

Other psychosocial factors associated with poor dental health in teenagers were if the mother stated in the questionnaire that she did not look after her own teeth or if the father stated that he was dissatisfied with his social situation.