Lifetime discrimination in low to middle income mothers and cellular aging: A prospective analysis

Judith E Carroll; Jonah Eliezer Price; Joni Brown; Olajide Bamishigbin; Madeleine U Shalowitz; Sharon Ramey; Christine Dunkel Schetter

doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.115356

Lifetime discrimination in low to middle income mothers and cellular aging: A prospective analysis

Soc Sci Med. 2022 Oct:311:115356. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.115356. Epub 2022 Sep 8.

Authors

Judith E Carroll¹, Jonah Eliezer Price², Joni Brown², Olajide Bamishigbin³, Madeleine U Shalowitz⁴, Sharon Ramey⁵, Christine Dunkel Schetter⁶

Affiliations

¹ University of California, Los Angeles, Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology, Department of Psychiatry & Biobehavioral Science, David Geffen School of Medicine, Jane & Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience & Human Behavior, United States. Electronic address: jcarroll@mednet.ucla.edu.
² University of California, Los Angeles, Department of Psychology, United States.
³ California State University, Long Beach, United States.
⁴ NorthShore University HealthSystem, Department of Pediatrics, Rush University, Department of Psychiatry, United States.
⁵ Virginia Tech, Fralin Biomedical Research Institute, Departments of Psychology, Neuroscience, and Human Development, Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Medicine and Pediatrics, United States.
⁶ University of California, Los Angeles, Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology, Department of Psychiatry & Biobehavioral Science, David Geffen School of Medicine, Jane & Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience & Human Behavior, United States; University of California, Los Angeles, Department of Psychology, United States.

Abstract

Background: Experiences of discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, and other characteristics are associated with adverse health outcomes, including elevated rates of morbidity in later life and earlier mortality. Acceleration of biological aging is a plausible pathway linking discrimination to disease risk. The objective of this study was to examine the relationship of self-reported lifetime and everyday discrimination to women's telomere length several years after birth of a child in a longitudinal cohort study.

Methods: The Community Child Health Network (CCHN) conducted a community-based participatory research project focused on racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic disparities in maternal and child health. Data for the current substudy are from a longitudinal cohort study in 3 of the 5 project sites. This multi-site community-based longitudinal study was conducted in Lake County, IL north of Chicago, Washington, D.C., and rural North Carolina. Participants were low to middle-income mothers (N = 103) with a primary identity of Hispanic/Latina, Black, or non-Hispanic White who rated their experience of everyday and lifetime discrimination during an at-home interview one-month postpartum. Buccal samples were collected to assay buccal cell telomere length several years later when a consecutive child was 3-5 years of age. Telomere length derived from buccal cells was used as a biomarker indicating cellular aging and a risk factor for age-related disease.

Results: Mothers (18-39 years old) who reported higher lifetime discrimination had shorter telomere length an average of 5.6 years later (B = -0.22 [SE = 0.04], p < 0.001). Mother's reports of everyday discrimination were not significantly related to telomere length (0.01[0.01], p = 0.15).

Conclusions: These findings suggest that lifetime exposure to discrimination, but not necessarily current reports of everyday discrimination, may increase biological aging as indicated by shorter buccal cell telomere length, providing evidence of a plausible route through which discrimination contributes to increased risk for earlier onset aging and age-related disease in women.

Keywords: Biological aging; Discrimination; Maternal health; Mothers; Telomere length; Women.

Abstract

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