Search Results

Methods: A secondary analysis using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth Child (1992–2000) and Young Adult (1996–2004) surveys were analyzed (N = 1,592). Logistic regression models estimated reports of cohesion, flexibility, communication, monitoring, and satisfaction with time spent together with sexual initiation by age 16. All models controlled for the mother's sociodemographic characteristics, lack of independence due to sisters in the sample, and extended time away from mother.

Results: Girls who reported being satisfied with the amount of time spent with their mother were less likely to report early sexual initiation. In addition, these girls were three times more likely to report good communication and four times more likely to report high levels of cohesion with their mothers. Individually, in addition to satisfaction with time spent together, high levels of cohesion and good communication were also associated with lower reports of sexual initiation by age 16.

Clinical Implications: The feeling of being satisfied with the time spent together appears to be a global measure of the individual dimensions of cohesion and communication. Efforts in delaying sexual initiation in adolescents need to be directed at the mother–daughter relationship. Interventions to develop these dimensions within the relationship during early adolescence, as compared to interventions when sexual activity may have already occurred, are warranted.

© 2012 Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Inc.

An instrumental variable approach was used to estimate a causal effect of child BMI z-score on age of menarche. The instrumental variables were pre-pregnancy BMI, high gestational weight gain and smoking during pregnancy. We found strong effects of maternal age of menarche, birthweight, and child BMI z-score (−5.23, 95% CI [−7.35,−3.12]) for both African-Americans and whites. Age of menarche declined with increases in exposure to poverty during early childhood for whites. There was no effect of poverty for African-Americans. We used Oaxaca decomposition techniques to determine how much of the overall race difference in age of menarche was attributable to race differences in observable factors and how much was due to race dependent responses. The African-American/white difference in childhood BMI explained about 18% of the overall difference in age of menarche and birthweight differences explained another 11%.

We provide empirical evidence that relative deprivation but not absolute income was associated with birth weight in full term infants, controlling for tract poverty rate, maternal education, marital status, urban residence and maternal age. The findings provided qualified support for acceptance of an independent association between cumulative relative deprivation and full term infant birth weight, when not controlling for race/ethnicity. Evaluated at mean birth weight, a one standard deviation increase in cumulative relative deprivation led to a decrease in birth weight of approximately 1.5 ounces. We also provided evidence that the association between cumulative relative deprivation and birth weight was confounded by race/ethnicity. The mechanisms emphasized in the literature for a plausible relationship between health and relative deprivation, such as psychosocial stress and diminished purchasing power of a given level of income, were equally plausible as mechanisms through which race effects individual health. We found evidence that two behaviors which reduced birth weight (decreased weight gain during pregnancy and increased smoking during pregnancy) were positively associated with cumulative relative deprivation. The negative impact of cumulative relative deprivation on birth weight operated directly, when not controlling for race/ethnicity, and indirectly through its effect on decreased weight gain during pregnancy and increased smoking during pregnancy.

[Copyright 2007 Elsevier] Copyright of Social Science & Medicine is the property of Pergamon Press - An Imprint of Elsevier Science and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts)

Methods. Data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth's Child-Mother file were used to implement these analyses. A total of 3022 children were included in this sample. For inclusion in this sample, valid information on height and weight during 3 consecutive interviews when the child was aged 24 to 95 months as well as valid data on prenatal and birth characteristics were needed. The primary outcome measure was childhood overweight (BMI <95th percentile). Multivariate logistic models and first-order Markov models were estimated.

Results. Early development of childhood overweight was associated with race, ethnicity, maternal prepregnancy obesity, maternal smoking during pregnancy, and later birth years. In later years, the factor that contributed the most to being overweight was having been overweight in the previous observation period. However, with conditioning on the child's having been overweight in the previous observation period, the prenatal factors that contributed to early childhood overweight, except for birth cohort, were also associated with development of overweight among children who had previously been normal weight and perpetuated the persistence of overweight over time.

Conclusions. This research suggests that prenatal characteristics, particularly race, ethnicity, maternal smoking during pregnancy, and maternal prepregnancy obesity, exert influence on the child's weight states through an early. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Methods: The aim was to determine if the health risk profiles of daughters (born 1975–1992) were different from their mothers (born 1957–1964) measured when both were between the ages of 17 and 24 years. The U.S.-based National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 and associated Children and Young Adult Surveys were used. The sample was 2411 non-Hispanic white and African American girls born to 1701 mothers. Outcomes were height, weight, body mass index (BMI), age of menarche, and self-reported health.

Results: In both races, daughters were taller but entered adulthood at greater risk for the development of chronic illness than their mothers. Racial differences were greater in the daughters’ generation than in the mothers’. Whites in both generations experienced educational differences in health based upon the mother’s educational level, with fewer years of maternal education associated with poorer health. African Americans of both generations experienced differences by maternal education in self-reported health. However, when African American daughters were compared with their mothers, daughters born to college educated women gained more weight and had higher BMI and earlier menarche than did daughters born to high school dropouts.

Conclusion: Health deterioration across generations in both races suggests that much work is needed to meet Healthy People 2020 goals of health equity.

OBJECTIVES:: Two research questions were addressed in this article: (a) Within each race, at what ages were BMI and height differences evident among the early-, the mid-, and the late-onset groups? And (b) within each timing group, at what ages were BMI and height differences evident between White and African American girls?

METHODS:: The mother/child files of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth were used for this study. Menarcheal timing groups were identified using the 25th and the 75th percentile of the age distribution for each race. Longitudinal statistical techniques were used to estimate BMI and height as polynomial functions of age and age relative to menarche for African American and White girls.

RESULTS:: Significant differences in BMI by timing group were found. By 3 years of age, significant differences were found between early- and mid-onset African American girls, by 5 years of age between mid- and late-onset African American girls, and by 6 years of age among the three timing groups of White girls. Significant height differences were evident by 5 years of age when comparing early- to mid-onset and mid- to late-onset girls in both race groups. Comparing across race and within timing group, BMI and height differences were evident. African American girls were more likely than White girls to experience accelerated growth and earlier menarche.

DISCUSSION:: This is one of the few longitudinal studies of differences in growth by timing of menarche that includes data on girls younger than 5 years with large samples of both African American and White girls. Understanding when differences are first apparent is critical in establishing the critical period for prevention of these high-risk growth patterns.

METHODS: This observational study used a total of 3395 white (n = 2127) and African-American (n = 1268) children aged 96 to 119 months from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. Behavior Problem Index (BPI) total and subscale scores were used to measure children's behavioral problems. The association between maternal prepregnancy obesity and the BPI scores for each racial group was examined using multivariate linear and logistic regressions, controlling for prenatal, child, maternal, and family background factors.

RESULTS: Maternal prepregnancy obesity was independently associated with an increase in the BPI total scores among the white sample only. Among the African-Americans, prepregnancy obesity was not associated with the BPI scores. Subsample analyses using externalizing and internalizing subscales also revealed similar trends. Among the white sample, children born to obese women were more socially disadvantaged than those born to nonobese women, whereas no such trend was observed in children of African-American obese and nonobese women.

CONCLUSION: The impact of maternal prepregnancy obesity on children's behavioral problems differed by racial groups. Obesity-related metabolic dysregulations during the intrauterine period may not contribute to later children's behavioral problems. Social and psychological factors seem to play key roles in the association between prepregnancy obesity and childhood behavioral problems among whites.