Ethnic and Cultural Factors in Identifying Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders

Abstract

A large percentage of those involved in the criminal justice system are poor and represent ethnic minorities, and many of them were born to mothers who drank during pregnancy. In this article, we review literature pertaining to physical, social, cognitive, and neurological deficits of individuals with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD), exploring the possibility that these deficits or their outward expression may be affected by cultural and ethnic influences. For the most part, the evidence suggests that the indicators of FASD are universal across all racial and cultural groups. These indicators are, however, often obscured in individuals from certain backgrounds, due to the salience of what might be termed “cultural overshadowing.” This could be considered a form of unconscious or institutional discrimination, in that it denies criminal defendants from certain cultural backgrounds the opportunity to have courts take into account the possibility that their alleged or proven offenses were affected by serious brain-based impairments in reasoning and judgment. The law allows for consideration of these impairments in both sentencing and mitigation.