Does biological age mediate the relationship between childhood adversity and depression? Insights from the Detroit Neighborhood Health Study.

The link between childhood adversity and adulthood depression is well-established; however, the underlying mechanisms are still being explored. Recent research suggests biological age may mediate the relationship between childhood adversity and depression in later life. This study examines if biological age mediates the relationship between childhood adversity and depression symptoms using an expanded set of biological age measures in an urban population-based cohort. Data from waves 1-3 of the Detroit Neighborhood Health Study (DNHS) were used in this analysis. Questions about abuse during childhood were coded to form a childhood adversity score similar to the Adverse Childhood Experience measure. Multiple dimensions of biological age, defined as latent variables, were considered, including systemic biological age (GrimAge, PhenoAge), epigenetic age (Horvath, SkinBlood), and immune age (cytomegalovirus, herpes simplex virus type 1, C-reactive protein, interleukin-6). Depression symptoms, modeled as a latent variable, were captured through the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9). Models were adjusted for age, gender, race, parent education, and past depressive symptoms. Total and direct effects of childhood adversity on depression symptoms and indirect effects mediated by biological age were estimated. For total and direct effects, we observed a dose-dependent relationship between cumulative childhood adversity and depression symptoms, with emotional abuse being particularly influential. However, contrary to prior studies, in this sample, we found few direct effects of childhood adversity on biological age or biological age on depression symptoms and no evidence of mediation through the measures of biological age considered in this study. Further research is needed to understand how childhood maltreatment experiences are embodied to influence health and wellness.

Conceptualization, Operationalization, and Utilization of Race and Ethnicity in Major Epidemiology Journals, 1995-2018: A Systematic Review.

Despite repeated calls by scholars to critically engage with the concepts of race and ethnicity in US epidemiologic research, the incorporation of these social constructs in scholarship may be suboptimal. This study characterizes the conceptualization, operationalization, and utilization of race and ethnicity in US research published in leading journals whose publications shape discourse and norms around race, ethnicity, and health within the field of epidemiology. We systematically reviewed randomly selected articles from prominent epidemiology journals across 5 periods: 1995-1999, 2000-2004, 2005-2009, 2010-2014, and 2015-2018. All original human-subjects research conducted in the United States was eligible for review. Information on definitions, measurement, coding, and use in analysis was extracted. We reviewed 1,050 articles, including 414 (39%) in our analyses. Four studies explicitly defined race and/or ethnicity. Authors rarely made clear delineations between race and ethnicity, often adopting an ethnoracial construct. In the majority of studies across time periods, authors did not state how race and/or ethnicity was measured. Top coding schemes included "Black, White" (race), "Hispanic, non-Hispanic" (ethnicity), and "Black, White, Hispanic" (ethnoracial). Most often, race and ethnicity were deemed "not of interest" in analyses (e.g., control variables). Broadly, disciplinary practices have remained largely the same between 1995 and 2018 and are in need of improvement.