Search

Longitudinal effects of childhood community adversity on young adulthood outcomes are examined by integrating community disorganization theory with the life course perspective and family developmental research. The study focuses on the pathways that mediate the influence of childhood community context on later socioeconomic achievement and mental health outcomes. Data for this study were obtained from the 1990 U.S. Census and from the 1995, 1996 and 2001 cycles of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (N = 14,000). Results of multilevel path models show direct and indirect influences of early community adversity and family context. Childhood exposure to adverse environments had a direct longitudinal impact on young adult educational attainment, while the effect on young adult depression was indirect, mediated by adolescent depression and family and transitional processes during adolescence. An examination of cross-level moderating effects showed findings consistent with the "contextual dissipation" hypothesis; family context did not influence adolescent adjustments and transitions under severe adverse community conditions. The study's findings show the importance of integrating multiple theoretical perspectives for longitudinal research on community context to capture differential processes that are of particular significance at different stages of the life course. By understanding multi-level social, familial, and individual processes through which the community influences adolescents' adjustment and young adult outcomes, we are better able to design effective prevention/intervention policies and programs at different levels ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigated family-of-origin (FOO) socioeconomic (SES) patterning of depressive symptom trajectories of youth from early adolescence to emerging adulthood using a cohort sequential design that included three waves of data from 14,500 adolescents (ADHEALTH). Specifically, this work examined mean depressive symptom trajectories within SES marker categories, direct and indirect FOO-SES (poverty) influences on individual depressive symptom trajectories through risks and resources, and successive linking of youth risks and resources to elucidate mechanisms of FOO influence. Group mean trajectory plots provide evidence for a clear FOO-SES patterning of depressive symptom trajectories indicating that SES differences gradually decrease through adolescence minimizing at high school completion and then reemerge upon entering adulthood. Linear regression analyses showed the varying total influence of FOO-SES (poverty classes) on the level of depressive symptoms at different ages and provided further support for this FOO-SES patterning of depressive symptom trajectories. Growth Curve Analyses showed that different age-based experiences also partly mediated the influence of FOO-SES depending on specific age segments. Path analyses indicated successive linking of these experiences producing a web of indirect effects. These findings are consistent with a cumulative life course perspective. Discussion focuses on implications of these findings and addresses study limitations. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Marital status is a powerful health determinant for North American adults. On mental health, this effect is pertinent for mood disorders, such as depression, and clinical disorders, such as psychosis. However, though our understanding of marital status and mental health trajectories is detailed for group-level differences in illness prevalence, whether this effect applies to mental illness convalescence remains uncertain. This paper investigates if marital status affects mental health convalescence, using an administrative dataset that contains data for an entire population of mental health care users, in British Columbia, Canada. The paper measures convalescence as number of days under formal treatment, and considers whether marital status has disorder-specific effects on convalescence. The findings indicate that being never married represents a health disadvantage, with never married individuals having longer convalescence times than the married, separated/divorced widowed. In addition, the paper's findings demonstrate that marital status influences convalescence differences conditional on several DSM-IV mental health conditions. Never married persons have the slowest recuperation periods for all DSM groupings considered . However, the empirical findings question whether being married represents a health benefit, because separate/divorced and widowed individuals have better recuperation periods than married individuals for several DSM groupings. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study proposes ethnic and host society identities as potentially important factors of psychological and physical self-concept during adolescence and young adulthood in a culturally diverse society. Both social identity theory and the ethnic identity development model suggest that a strong identification with ethnic group or majority group in a society promote overall self-concept (Phinney 1989, 1990, 2003; Tajfel 1978). The data analyzed are derived from the Growing Up Canadian Project (Noh and Kasper 2003) that includes 585 adolescents and young adults living in the metropolitan area of Toronto, Canada; who were interviewed at their home in 1997 and 1998. The results support that ethnic and host society identities are important to both psychological and physical self-concept of adolescents and young adults. The analyses of specific dimensions of ethnic and host society identity show pride as the most important aspect of these identities for both psychological and physical self-concept. Additionally, the effectiveness of ethnic pride and host society pride/attachment varies by nativity status. In sum, findings of this study suggest importance of including not only ethnic identity, but also host society identity and analyzing their specific dimensions in future studies of self-concept and group identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]