Social Class, Sex, and the Ability to Recognize Emotions: The Main Effect is in the Interaction.

Previous research has demonstrated an inverse relation between subjective social class (SSC) and performance on emotion recognition tasks. Study 1 (N = 418) involved a preregistered replication of this effect using the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Task and the Cambridge Mindreading Face-Voice Battery. The inverse relation replicated; however, exploratory analyses revealed a significant interaction between sex and SSC in predicting emotion recognition, indicating that the effect was driven by males. In Study 2 (N = 745), we preregistered and tested the interaction on a separate archival dataset. The interaction replicated; the association between SSC and emotion recognition again occurred only in males. Exploratory analyses (Study 3; N = 381) examined the generalizability of the interaction to incidental face memory. Our results underscore the need to reevaluate previous research establishing the main effects of social class and sex on emotion recognition abilities, as these effects apparently moderate each other.

Adversity, Adaptive Calibration, and Health: The Case of Disadvantaged Families.

Epidemiologists and medical researchers often employ an allostatic load model that focuses on environmental and lifestyle factors, together with biological vulnerabilities, to explain the deterioration of human physiological systems and chronic degenerative disease. Although this perspective has informed medicine and public health, it is agnostic toward the functional significance of pathophysiology and health deterioration. Drawing on Life History (LH) theory, the current paper reviews the literature on disadvantaged families to serve as a conceptual model of stress-health relationships in which the allocation of reproductive effort is instantiated in the LH strategies of individuals and reflects the bioenergetic and material resource tradeoffs. We propose that researchers interested in health disparities reframe chronic degenerative diseases as outcomes resulting from strategic calibration of physiological systems to best adapt, survive, and reproduce in response to demands of specific developmental contexts. These effects of adversity on later-age degenerative disease are mediated, in part, by socioemotional and cognitive mechanisms expressed in different life history strategies.

Father absence, body mass index, and pubertal timing in girls: differential effects by family income and ethnicity.

PURPOSE: Numerous studies show associations between father absence and girls' early puberty. However, most research has been retrospective, focused on menarche, and failed to consider body mass index (BMI), ethnicity, and income in the analyses. This study resolves these scientific gaps. METHODS: This was a prospective study of 444 girls aged 6-8 years and their caregivers (96% mothers). Data were collected annually in clinic, including weight, height, and Tanner stage for breast and pubic hair. Caregivers reported on father absence and demographics. This report focuses on the assessment of father absence at baseline and 2 years of follow-up for pubertal outcomes. Cox proportional hazards regression models were used to test whether father absence at baseline predicted pubertal onset by follow-up visit 2. BMI was assumed to be in the causal pathway. Differences by ethnicity and income were examined. RESULTS: Income and ethnicity moderated associations between father absence and pubertal onset when adjusting for BMI. Father absence predicted earlier onset of breast development only in higher-income families and onset of pubic hair development only in higher-income African Americans families. BMI was not related to father absence and therefore was not in the causal pathway. CONCLUSION: Among girls from higher-income families, father absence was linked to earlier puberty. This was particularly true for African Americans in terms of pubic hair development. These effects are not explained by body weight. Future research is needed to identify social and biophysiological mechanisms through which father absence, ethnicity, and income affect the pubertal onset.