Sex differences in the impact of childhood socioeconomic status on immune function.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Gassen J
PROVIDER: S-EPMC8110986 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
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Project description:Socioeconomic status (SES) predicts health, wellbeing, and cognitive ability, including executive function (EF). A body of recent work has shown that childhood SES is positively related to EF, but it is not known whether this disparity grows, diminishes or holds steady over development, from childhood through adulthood. We examined the association between childhood SES and EF in a sample ranging from 9-25 years of age, with six canonical EF tasks. Analyzing all of the tasks together and in functionally defined groups, we found positive relations between SES and EF, and the relations did not vary by age. Analyzing the tasks separately, SES was positively associated with performance in some but not all EF measures, depending on the covariates used, again without varying by age. These results add to a growing body of evidence that childhood SES is associated with EF abilities, and contribute novel evidence concerning the persistence of this association into early adulthood.
| S-EPMC6108482 | biostudies-literature
Project description:We examined children's sleep at age 9 as a predictor of developmental trajectories of cognitive performance from ages 9 to 11 years. The effects of sleep on cognition are not uniform and thus we tested race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status (SES), and sex as moderators of these associations. At the first assessment, 282 children aged 9.44 years (52% boys, 65% European American [EA], 35% African American [AA]) participated. Two more waves of data collection spaced 1 year apart followed. The majority of children (63%) were living at or below the poverty line. Children's sleep was measured objectively with actigraphy and 2 well-established sleep parameters were derived: duration, indexed by sleep minutes between sleep onset and wake time, and quality, indexed by efficiency. Multiple cognitive functioning domains were examined with the Woodcock Johnson Tests of Cognitive Abilities (WJ III). Across the sample, higher sleep efficiency, but not duration, was associated with better cognitive performance. Significant moderation effects emerged. Controlling for SES, AA children scored lower on general intellectual ability and working memory (WM) at age 11 only if they experienced lower sleep efficiency at age 9. Further, boys scored lower on general abilities and processing speed (PS) at age 11 only if their sleep efficiency was lower at age 9. Findings indicate that lower sleep efficiency may contribute to lower cognitive functioning especially for AA children and boys. These vulnerabilities appear to emerge early in development and are maintained over time. Results underscore the importance of individual differences in explicating relations between sleep and children's cognitive performance. (PsycINFO Database Record
| S-EPMC5481465 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Background and objectivesPrior research has established steep socioeconomic status (SES) disparities in children's cognitive skills at kindergarten entry. Yet, few studies have had comprehensive, multi-informant data to examine SES-related differences in foundational social and emotional skills and executive function. The objective of the current study is to systematically examine SES-related differences in young children's executive function (EF), self-regulation skills, and behaviors.MethodsThe current study analyzed data on 2,309 young children from the Early Learning Study at Harvard (ELS@H). Multi-method (direct-assessment and reports) and multi-informant (parents and early education and care educators) information on children's executive function, self-regulation skills, and internalizing, externalizing, and adaptive behaviors were used. A parametric framework employing Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) estimation was used to quantify the size of the SES-related differences in this set of children's foundational social-emotional skills.ResultsOn average, there were differences of 0.24-0.45 SD for EF, 0.22-0.32 SD for self-regulation skills, and 0.27-0.54 SD for behaviors favoring children from the highest SES quartile of the distribution of SES relative to children from the lowest quartile. The SES-related differences were consistent across direct assessment, parent reports, and educator reports. Some differences were larger for older children relative to their younger counterparts.ConclusionsFindings indicate a need for comprehensive intervention efforts well before kindergarten entry aimed at closing early disparities in children's foundational social and emotional skills and executive function.
| S-EPMC9629624 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Estimated heritability of educational attainment (EA) varies widely, from 23% to 80%, with growing evidence suggesting the degree to which genetic variation contributes to individual differences in EA is highly dependent upon situational factors. We aimed to decompose EA into influences attributable to genetic propensity and to environmental context and their interplay, while considering influences of rearing household economic status (HES) and sex. We use the Project Talent Twin and Sibling Study, drawn from the population-representative cohort of high school students assessed in 1960 and followed through 2014, to ages 68-72. Data from 3552 twins and siblings from 1741 families were analyzed using multilevel regression and multiple group structural equation models. Individuals from less-advantaged backgrounds had lower EA and less variation. Genetic variance accounted for 51% of the total variance, but within women and men, 40% and 58% of the total variance respectively. Men had stable genetic variance on EA across all HES strata, whereas high HES women showed the same level of genetic influence as men, and lower HES women had constrained genetic influence on EA. Unexpectedly, middle HES women showed the largest constraints in genetic influence on EA. Shared family environment appears to make an outsized contribution to greater variability for women in this middle stratum and whether they pursue more EA. Implications are that without considering early life opportunity, genetic studies on education may mischaracterize sex differences because education reflects different degrees of genetic and environmental influences for women and men.
| S-EPMC10497722 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The developmental health of young children is highly influenced by the socioeconomic conditions in which they are raised. How to accurately measure these conditions is a point of debate in the current literature on child development, health, and social determinants. We have evaluated four existing indices of socioeconomic status (SES) to determine the most relevant for the analysis of early childhood development (ECD) in Canada. Following a literature review of published SES indices which used 2006 Canadian Census data, four indices were chosen based on their relevance to ECD and the number of citations in subsequent articles. These were: the Canadian Deprivation Index, the Socioeconomic Factor Index, the Canadian Marginalization Index and an index created by the Early Childhood Mapping Project in Alberta, Canada. The indices were replicated using SES data for 2038 customized geographic neighbourhoods encompassing 99.9% of the Canadian population, and the relationship of the indices to ECD was investigated by linking to aggregated data from the Early Development Instrument (EDI), a teacher-completed questionnaire used to assess kindergarten children's physical, social, emotional, and cognitive development, and communication skills. The derived SES indices were compared based on four criteria: the input variables used, the index structure, the interpretability of the index and the variance they explained (R2) in the different EDI outcome measures. In terms of variance explained, material components of the SES indices (e.g., income, education) consistently showed the strongest association with children's language and cognitive development. The patterns of association for the non-material SES components and the other developmental domains of the EDI were more complex. We discuss the findings in regard to current developments in the field, and the need for refining empirical and theoretical approaches to examine associations between different facets of SES contextual factors and different aspects of ECD outcomes.
| S-EPMC5769026 | biostudies-other
Project description:Socioeconomic adversity in early life is related to cardiovascular risk in adulthood; however, no studies have examined whether such adversity may be related to endogenous sex hormones, which are themselves associated with cardiovascular outcomes, or whether the timing of adversity exposures (childhood vs. puberty) matters.The goal of the current study was to separately examine neighborhood socioeconomic status (SES) during periods of childhood and puberty in relation to adulthood levels of endogenous sex hormones (estradiol [E2], testosterone), sex hormone binding globulin (SHBG), and a derived index of bioavailable testosterone (free androgen index).In a sample of 143 premenopausal women (mean age = 36.8 [SD = 5.5]; 51.7% White, 32.2% African American, 5.6% Latina, 7.0% Chinese, and 3.5% Filipina), retrospective reports of residential address information in designated periods of childhood and puberty were used to derive U.S. census-based neighborhood SES composite scores characterizing the socioeconomic environments of women during these periods.In covariate-adjusted analyses, higher neighborhood SES in puberty predicted higher levels of SHBG in adulthood, but neighborhood SES during childhood did not (standardized regression coefficient = .24, p = .01 vs. standardized regression coefficient = .04, p = .75, respectively). Neighborhood SES was not predictive of other hormones (E2, testosterone, and free androgen index).The current findings suggest that puberty may be a time of particular vulnerability to the effects of neighborhood SES on SHBG levels, which have been linked to cardiovascular risk factor profiles and atherosclerotic disease progression.
| S-EPMC4841463 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Socioeconomic status (SES) discrepancies exist for child and adult cancer morbidity and are a major public health concern. In this Swiss population-based matched case-control study on the etiology of childhood leukemia, we selected the cases from the Swiss Childhood Cancer Registry diagnosed since 1991 and the controls randomly from census. We assigned eight controls per case from the 1990 and 2000 census and matched them by the year of birth and gender. SES information for both cases and controls was obtained from census records by probabilistic record linkage. We investigated the association of SES with childhood leukemia in Switzerland, and explored whether it varied with different definitions of socioeconomic status (parental education, living condition, area-based SES), time period, and age. In conditional logistic regression analyses of 565 leukemia cases and 4433 controls, we found no consistent evidence for an association between SES and childhood leukemia. The odds ratio comparing the highest with the lowest SES category ranged from 0.95 (95% CI: 0.71-1.26; P trend?=?0.73) for paternal education to 1.37 (1.00-1.89; P trend?=?0.064) for maternal education. No effect modification was found for time period and age at diagnosis. Based on this population-based study, which avoided participation and reporting bias, we assume the potential association of socioeconomic status and childhood leukemia if existing to be small. This study did not find evidence that socioeconomic status, of Switzerland or comparable countries, is a relevant risk factor or strong confounder in etiological investigations on childhood leukemia.
| S-EPMC4485172 | biostudies-literature
Project description:ObjectiveTo examine associations of parental socioeconomic position with early-life offspring body mass index (BMI) trajectories in a middle-income country.SubjectsOverall, 12,385 Belarusian children born 1996-97 and enrolled in a randomised breastfeeding promotion trial at birth, with 3-14 measurements of BMI from birth to 7 years.MethodsCohort analysis in which exposures were parental education (common secondary or less; advanced secondary or partial university; completed university) and occupation (manual; non-manual) at birth, and the outcome was BMI z-score trajectories estimated using multilevel linear spline models, controlling for trial arm, location, parental BMI, maternal smoking status and number of older siblings.ResultsInfants born to university-educated mothers were heavier at birth than those born to secondary school-educated mothers [by 0.13 BMI z-score units (95% confidence interval, CI: 0.07, 0.19) for girls and 0.11 (95% CI: 0.05, 0.17) for boys; equivalent for an infant of average birth length to 43 and 38 g, respectively]. Between the ages of 3-7 years children of the most educated mothers had larger BMI increases than children of the least educated mothers. At age 7 years, after controlling for trial arm and location, children of university-educated mothers had higher BMIs than those born to secondary school-educated mothers by 0.11 z-score (95% CI: 0.03, 0.19) among girls and 0.18 (95% CI: 0.1, 0.27) among boys, equivalent to differences in BMI for a child of average height of 0.19 and 0.26 kg/m2, respectively. After further controlling for parental BMI, these differences attenuated to 0.08 z-score (95% CI: 0, 0.16) and 0.16 z-score (95% CI: 0.07, 0.24), respectively, but changed very little after additional adjustment for number of older siblings and mother's smoking status. Associations were similar when based on paternal educational attainment and highest household occupation.ConclusionsIn Belarus, consistent with some middle-income countries, higher socioeconomic position was associated with greater BMI trajectories from age 3 onwards.
| S-EPMC6033313 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The socioeconomic status (SES) and health behaviors of workers are associated with the risks of developing obesity, diabetes, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, and other cardiovascular diseases. Herein, we investigated the factors influencing cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk based on the SES of male and female workers. This cross-sectional analysis used the National Health Information Database to assess the associations between gender, SES (income level, residential area), health behaviors, and CVD-related health status of workers, through multinomial logistic regression. Upon analysis of a large volume of data on workers during 2016, the smoking and drinking trends of male and female workers were found to differ, causing different odds ratio (OR) tendencies of the CVD risk. Also, while for male workers, higher ORs of obesity or abdominal obesity were associated with higher incomes or residence in metropolitan cities, for female workers, they were associated with lower incomes or residence in rural areas. Additionally, among the factors influencing CVD risk, lower income and residence in rural areas were associated with higher CVD risk for male and female workers. The study findings imply the importance of developing gender-customized intervention programs to prevent CVD, due to gender-specific associations between CVD-related health status and health behaviors according to SES.
| S-EPMC7143716 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Family socioeconomic status (SES) is an important factor that affects an individual's neural and cognitive development. The two novel aims of this study were to reveal (a) the effects of family SES on mean diffusivity (MD) using diffusion tensor imaging given the characteristic property of MD to reflect neural plasticity and development and (b) the sex differences in SES effects. In a study cohort of 1,216 normal young adults, we failed to find significant main effects of family SES on MD; however, previously observed main effects of family SES on regional gray matter volume and fractional anisotropy (FA) were partly replicated. We found a significant effect of the interaction between sex and family income on MD in the thalamus as well as significant effects of the interaction between sex and parents' educational qualification (year's of education) on MD and FA in the body of the corpus callosum as well as white matter areas between the anterior cingulate cortex and lateral prefrontal cortex. These results suggest the sex-specific associations of family SES with neural and/or cognitive mechanisms particularly in neural tissues in brain areas that play key roles in basic information processing and higher-order cognitive processes in a way females with greater family SES level show imaging outcome measures that have been associated with more neural tissues (such as greater FA and lower MD) and males showed opposite.
| S-EPMC6345688 | biostudies-literature