Childhood socioeconomic status and genetic risk for poorer cognition in later life

Objective: We investigated the association between childhood socioeconomic status (SES) and coronary heart disease (CHD) in older Americans. Method: We used Health and Retirement Study data from 1992 to 2012 to examine a nationally representative sample of Americans aged ≥50 years ( N = 30,623). We modeled CHD as a function of childhood and adult SES using maternal and paternal educational level as a proxy for childhood SES. Results: Respondents reporting low childhood SES were significantly more likely to have CHD than respondents reporting high childhood SES. Respondents reporting both low childhood and adult SES were 2.34 times more likely to have CHD than respondents reporting both high childhood and adult SES. People with low childhood SES and high adult SES were 1.60 times more likely than people with high childhood SES and high adult SES to report CHD in the fully adjusted model. High childhood SES and low adult SES increased the likelihood of CHD by 13%, compared with high SES both as a child and adult. Conclusion: Childhood SES is significantly associated with increased risk of CHD in later life among older adult Americans.

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Childhood Socioeconomic Status and Later Life Cognition: Evidence From the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study

Journal of Aging and Health ◽

10.1177/0898264318783489 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 31 (9) ◽

pp. 1589-1615 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Emily A. Greenfield ◽

Sara M. Moorman

Keyword(s):

Socioeconomic Status ◽

Executive Function ◽

Longitudinal Study ◽

Household Income ◽

Statistical Significance ◽

Occupational Status ◽

Later Life ◽

Socioeconomic Differences ◽

Wisconsin Longitudinal Study ◽

Childhood Socioeconomic Status

Objectives:This study examined childhood socioeconomic status (SES) as a predictor of later life cognition and the extent to which midlife SES accounts for associations. Methods: Data came from 5,074 participants in the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study. Measures from adolescence included parents’ educational attainment, father’s occupational status, and household income. Memory and language/executive function were assessed at ages 65 and 72 years. Results: Global childhood SES was a stronger predictor of baseline levels of language/executive function than baseline memory. Associations involving parents’ education were reduced in size and by statistical significance when accounting for participants’ midlife SES, whereas associations involving parental income and occupational status became statistically nonsignificant. We found no associations between childhood SES and change in cognition. Discussion: Findings contribute to growing evidence that socioeconomic differences in childhood have potential consequences for later life cognition, particularly in terms of the disparate levels of cognition with which people enter later life.

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Cardiometabolic Risk and Cognitive Decline: The Role of Socioeconomic Status in Childhood and Adulthood

Journal of Health and Social Behavior ◽

10.1177/0022146519867924 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 60 (3) ◽

pp. 326-343 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Katsuya Oi ◽

Steven Haas

Keyword(s):

Socioeconomic Status ◽

Cognitive Decline ◽

Cardiometabolic Risk ◽

Later Life ◽

Socioeconomic Attainment ◽

Childhood Socioeconomic Status ◽

Using Data ◽

The Impact ◽

Retirement Study

Socioeconomic conditions in childhood predict cognitive functioning in later life. It is unclear whether poor childhood socioeconomic status (SES) also predicts the acceleration of cognitive decline. One proposed pathway is via cardiometabolic risk, which has been linked to both childhood SES and earlier onset of cognitive impairment. Using data from the Health and Retirement Study, we examine the impact of childhood SES on cognitive trajectories over six years and test whether it operates through increased cardiometabolic risk and adult SES. We find that higher childhood SES leads to slower cognitive decline, partially due to lower levels of cardiometabolic risk. However, these pathways operate entirely through adult socioeconomic attainment. The results have important implications for future trends in cognitive population health within the context of growing social inequality and reduced social mobility.

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Early Life Circumstances and Cognitive Aging: Longitudinal Evidence From China Health and Retirement Study

Innovation in Aging ◽

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.202 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. 62-62

Author(s):

Zhuoer Lin ◽

Xi Chen

Keyword(s):

Socioeconomic Status ◽

Cognitive Decline ◽

Cognitive Aging ◽

Early Life ◽

Cognitive Deficit ◽

Later Life ◽

Health Conditions ◽

Childhood Socioeconomic Status ◽

Life Circumstances

Abstract Objectives: This study examines the long-term relationship between early life circumstances and later life cognitive aging. In particular, we differentiate the long-term effects of early life circumstances on level of cognitive deficit and rate of cognitive decline. Methods: Cognitive trajectories were measured using three waves of China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Surveys (CHARLS 2011-2015). Linear mixed-effect model was used to decompose the individual level of cognitive deficit and rate of cognitive change in a sample of Chinese middle-aged and older adults 45-90 years of age (N=6,700). These two dimensions of cognition were matched to four domains of early life circumstances using CHARLS Life History Survey (2014), including childhood socioeconomic status, neighborhood environment, social relationships and health conditions. Their associations were examined by linear regressions. Stratification analysis was further conducted to investigate the mediating effect of education on early life circumstances and cognitive aging. Results: Childhood socioeconomic status, childhood friendship and early life health conditions were significantly associated with both the level of cognitive deficit and rate of decline. In contrast, the community environment, including childhood neighborhood safety and social cohesion, only affected the baseline level of cognitive deficit; and childhood relationship with parents only affected the rate of cognitive decline. Moreover, education was found to be a mediating factor of these relationships. Conclusion: Exposure to disadvantaged early life circumstances have significant negative effects on later life cognitive deficit as well as rate of cognitive decline. Nevertheless, these long-term impacts can be partially ameliorated by higher educational attainment.

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The Association between Childhood Conditions and Heart Disease Among Middle-Aged and Older Population in China: A Life Course Perspective

10.21203/rs.3.rs-45858/v1 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Jingyue Zhang ◽

Nan Lu

Keyword(s):

Socioeconomic Status ◽

Heart Disease ◽

Life Course ◽

Later Life ◽

Life Course Perspective ◽

Older Age ◽

Self Rated Health ◽

Childhood Conditions ◽

Populations At Risk ◽

Childhood Socioeconomic Status

Abstract Background: Heart disease is a severe health problem among adult populations in China. The prevalence rates of heart disease increase with age. The pathogenic causes of heart disease are often related to conditions in early life. Using a nationally representative data from adults aged 45 or older in China, we examined the association between childhood conditions and heart disease in later life from a life course perspective.Methods: The data used in this study were derived from China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study; specifically, the life history module and 2015 wave. Face-to-face interviews were used to collect data from respondents aged 45 or older. Missing data were handled by multiple imputation, generating a final analytic sample of 19,800. Doctor-diagnosed heart disease was the main dependent variable. Random-effects logistic regression models were conducted to test the hypotheses.Results: A total of 16.6% respondents reported being diagnosed with heart disease by doctors. Regarding childhood socioeconomic status, 8.2% of the respondents considered that they were (a lot) better off than their neighbors, and 31.1% considered that their health status in childhood was better than their peers. More than 90% of respondents did not have severe illnesses during their childhood, and around 80.3% had access to health resources nearby in childhood. Socioeconomic status, self-rated health, and severe illnesses in childhood were significantly associated with heart disease after controlling for conditions in adulthood and older age (socioeconomic status: odds ratio (OR) = 0.950; self-rated health: OR = 0.923; severe illnesses: OR = 1.191).Conclusions: Childhood conditions play important roles in influencing the onset of heart disease in middle and older age in China. Poor childhood conditions should be considered as screening criteria to identify populations at risk of heart disease. Community-based preventive strategies and interventions should also be implemented to enhance health in later life.

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Childhood socioeconomic status and longitudinal patterns of alcohol problems: Variation across etiological pathways in genetic risk

Social Science & Medicine ◽

10.1016/j.socscimed.2018.05.027 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 209 ◽

pp. 51-58 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Peter B. Barr ◽

Judy Silberg ◽

Danielle M. Dick ◽

Hermine H. Maes

Keyword(s):

Socioeconomic Status ◽

Genetic Risk ◽

Alcohol Problems ◽

Longitudinal Patterns ◽

Childhood Socioeconomic Status

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Childhood Socioeconomic Status and Cognitive Aging: An Intersectional Life Course Perspective

Innovation in Aging ◽

10.1093/geroni/igab046.1994 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 5 (Supplement_1) ◽

pp. 519-519

Author(s):

Addam Reynolds ◽

Emily Greenfield ◽

Sara Moorman ◽

Laurent Reyes

Keyword(s):

Older Adults ◽

Socioeconomic Status ◽

Life Course ◽

Cognitive Performance ◽

Cognitive Aging ◽

Later Life ◽

The South ◽

Structural Racism ◽

Black Adults ◽

Childhood Socioeconomic Status

Abstract Greater childhood socioeconomic status (cSES) is associated with better later life cognition. Largely absent from this literature is how structural racism potentially influences this relationship. Guided by intersectional life course theory, we examined if the influence of cSES and region of schooling on later life cognitive outcomes differs among non-Hispanic White (NHW) and Black older adults. We used data from the 2010-2016 waves of the Health and Retirement Study for participants ages 65 and older in 2010. Using growth mixture modeling, we estimated the associations between race, cSES (parental education, social, and financial capital), and region of schooling at age 10 (southern versus not) on cognitive performance. Consistent with prior research, there was a main effect of race on cognitive performance levels (but not with decline over time), with lower scores among older Black adults, on average. Among NHWs, higher cSES was protective for later life cognition, especially for NHW participants from the South. Although Black older adults who attended school outside of the South had higher levels of cognitive performance than their counterparts who attended school at age 10 in the South, Black older adults who attended school outside of the South--regardless of cSES--still had lower average scores on cognition at baseline than the most disadvantaged NHW participants. This paper implicates the effects of structural racism on cognitive performance among older Black adults, indicating the need for heightened attention to structural racism within interventions for optimizing brain health and promoting equitable cognitive aging across the life course.

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Childhood socioeconomic status moderates genetic predisposition for peak smoking

10.1101/336834 ◽

2018 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Laura Bierut ◽

Pietro Biroli ◽

Titus J. Galama ◽

Kevin Thom

Keyword(s):

At Risk ◽

Socioeconomic Status ◽

Genetic Predisposition ◽

Genetic Variants ◽

Genetic Risk ◽

Risk Scores ◽

Low Ses ◽

High Genetic Risk ◽

Childhood Socioeconomic Status ◽

The U.S

AbstractSmoking is the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the U.S., and it is strongly influenced both by genetic predisposition and childhood socioeconomic status (SES). Using genetic variants exhibiting credible and robust associations with smoking, we construct polygenic risk scores (PGS) and evaluate whether childhood SES mediates genetic risk in determining peak-cigarette consumption in adulthood. We find a substantial protective effect of childhood SES for those genetically at risk of smoking: adult smokers who grew up in high-SES households tend to smoke roughly the same amount of cigarettesper day at peak (∼ 23 for low and ∼ 25 for high genetic risk individuals, or about 8%more), while individuals from low-SES backgrounds tend to smoke substantially more ifgenetically at risk (∼ 25 for low and ∼ 32 for high genetic risk individuals, or about 28% more).

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Gender Differences in the Association between Childhood Socioeconomic Status and Cognitive Function in Later Life

Journal of Geriatrics ◽

10.1155/2015/896876 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 2015 ◽

pp. 1-8 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Jiyoung Lyu

Keyword(s):

Gender Differences ◽

Socioeconomic Status ◽

Cognitive Function ◽

Memory Performance ◽

Memory Function ◽

Later Life ◽

Long Term Effects ◽

Growth Curve Models ◽

Childhood Socioeconomic Status ◽

The Impact

Objectives. This study was aimed to explore the gender differences in the association between childhood socioeconomic status (SES) and cognitive function in later life. Methods. Using a nationally representative sample from the Health and Retirement Study, 5,544 females and 3,863 males were analyzed separately. Growth curve models were used to examine memory status and change in memory from 1998 to 2010. Results. The results showed that SES disadvantage in childhood was associated with lower memory at baseline controlling for adult SES and other covariates. In addition, cumulated disadvantage in SES was associated with poor memory in both genders. Statistically, the impact of cumulative SES on memory function at baseline was significantly different by gender. Discussion. These findings suggest that childhood SES has long-term effects on cognitive function among both men and women, and cumulative SES from childhood to adulthood may be more important for men than women with respect to their memory performance.

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