longitudinal discrimination Flashcards
vicarious parental exposure in spillover effects
systemic review that looks at effects on kids when parents experience discrimination
determines main themes and pathways
spillover effects: maternal experiences of racism before childbirth
- Preterm birth
- Cortisol reactivity
- Lower birth weight
Mediators: depressive symptoms, gestational age
Moderators: ethnicity
spillover effects: parental experiences of discrimination after birth
After birth, parental experiences of discrimination:
- Same stuff as experiencing discrimination yourself
- Body weight, growth, etc
- Mental health
- Health care utlisation
- Cognitive development
- Socioemotional behaviour
Mediators: parental mental health, undesirable parenting practices, carer negative affect balance, child/youth distress
Moderators: parental ethnic group attachment, parental acculturation, child youth cultural association, how parents talk about race
what do mediators do?
explain connection between discrimination and outcomes
BERGER AND SARNYAI, 2015 NEUROBIOLOGY OF STRESS
Physiological aspect:
· Discrimination - social stress- activation of hpa axis = cortisol
3 types of responses to stress:
Normal = normal amount of cortisol
Exaggerated = toooo much cortisol
Blunted = not enough cortisol
heart rate variability in berger and sarnyai
HEART RATE VARIABILITY - related to the autonomic nervous system
· Higher heart rate variability is indicative of greater fitness and more resilience in the face of stress
· Generally decreases with age
· Low in black youth
· Low HRV associated with racial discrimination
Cortisol and HRV contribute to inflammatory processes that result in allostatic load (biological wear and tear)
berger and sarnyai downstream impacts of discrimination on brain networks
Downstream impacts of discrimination on brain networks
○ Prefrontal cortex - emotion regulation and stress response
Decreased grey matter in anterior cingulate cortex - emotion, impulse control, decision making
fiueroa et al 2021
How do daily minority stressors relate initial cortisol, cortisol awakening response, and diurnal cortisol in SGM young adults
- Daily diary study with cortisol spit samples
Findings:
· Minority stress associated with higher waking cortisol (already in body in waking)
· Higher cortisol 45 minutes after waking up
No differences 12 hours after waking or bedtime
gee et al, 2012: life course perspective racism and health inequities
Individual, historical, contextual factors impact individual differently across time, age, development
age patterned exposures (gee)
exposure to different things may change as a function of age - discrimination may change in frequency over time
age patterned exposures - women in the workforce (gee, 2007)
- Looked at frequency of gender based discrimination across the life force of women in the workforce
- Split people into birth cohorts…because…of age patterned exposure - different types of change, lose nuance of development by clumping all the ages together (10-15 is different from 60-65)
Found that age discrimination against women tends to be high in early 20s but decreases really quickly, climbs to highest peak at 55, then declines
- Split people into birth cohorts…because…of age patterned exposure - different types of change, lose nuance of development by clumping all the ages together (10-15 is different from 60-65)
Shows dramatic differences in exposure by age
assari et al, 2018 discrimination among black youth followed across 18 years
Increasing trajectory of exposure to racial discrimination over time
Steeper incline for:
- Men
- Iowa (very white state)
Those whose families earned more $
889 black youth
1/2 from georgia (large black popln)
1/2 from iowa (88% white)
10-12 at baseline
6 follow ups over 18 years
sensitive periods (gee)
Certain events have much stronger impacts on health when they are experienced during different developmental stages - think of sensitive periods of fetuses in utero (window for fetal alcohol syndrome)
In order to look at health impacts we need to look at how old people are when they experience discrimination and what point of their lives they’re in
sensitive periods, christophe and stein, 2021
What is the trajectory of depression across the life course
- How does discrimination in each decade of life impact deviations from that trajectory?
- Mostly gender based
- Data drawn from midlife in the united states dataset
- 3 assessments of people spaced 10 years apart
Found:
- Predicted downward trajectory of depressive symptoms
- For every decade of life, depressive symptoms went down by .03
- People who experienced more discrimination didn’t follow this pattern - had more depressive symptoms than the pattern suggested
Discrimination during the 40s lead to greater depression in the 50s
adam et al, 2015
Adolescent racial discrimination predicts
- lower waking cortisol levels among black participants
- Lower total daily cortisol in black adults
- Flatter slope
Young adult findings:
Emerging adult discrimination associated:
- Larger CAR among black adults
Takeaways:
Racial discrimination experienced as a teen matters a lot more for cortisol functioning in your 30s than more recent discrimination
