A Longitudinal Study of Health Risk Behavior in Youth

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This is a proposal for a cohort-sequential study of the full array of health-risk behaviors. Specific aims are to 1) compare contextual/risk factors, protective resources, and health behaviors of school-aged children as well as health-risk behaviors of early adolescents by gender and ethnicity; 2) identify how risk factors, protective resources, and health behaviors of school-aged children change over time; and 3) determine which set of risk factors and protective resources over grades 4, 5, and 6 best predict health-risk behaviors (sexual activity, tobacco use, alcohol and other drug use, dietary behaviors, physical activity, and behaviors that lead to intentional or unintentional injury) in early adolescence (7th and 8th grades). The leading causes of morbidity and mortality among American youth are associated with preventable, health-risk behaviors that tend to occur together. These behaviors are increasingly prevalent among ethnic minorities, yet little is known about factors that increase risk or provide protection against these behaviors. Using a cohort-sequential design, a convenience sample of 2200 ethnically diverse children in grades 4-6 in central Texas will be surveyed up to 5 years to meet these specific aims. Findings from the study will advance knowledge about health-risk behaviors in early adolescence by 1) emphasizing stress and ethnicity as understudied contextual/risk factors in school-aged children, 2) exploring understudied concepts of coping and humor as protective resources in school- aged children, 3) exploring the relationship between school-aged children's health behaviors and their health-risk behaviors in early adolescence, 4) identifying whether and how these risk factors and protective resources change over time and whether they predict health-risk behavior in early adolescence, and 5) exploring relationships among risk factors and protective resources that both moderate and mediate outcomes of health-risk behavior in both Anglo and Mexican American youth. The use of hierarchical linear models will increase understanding of how the major variables in the resilience model change over time and allow us to make inferences about the critical time at which to deliver interventions to reduce health-risk behaviors in early adolescence.