Innovative Modeling of Puberty and Substance Use Risk

青春期过渡期是精神病理学发展的最关键时期之一 以及由于广泛和同时的激素，身体和社会角色而导致的后期物质使用风险 这段时间发生的变化。目前的发育理论认为激素浓度 对青春期危险行为有直接的神经化学效应和间接的心理社会效应 过渡评估这些直接和间接影响将为构建有效的 对儿童和青少年使用药物的早期预防或干预方法。但这种 缺乏知识是由于（a）青春期特征的测量错误和（B）缺乏足够的 统计方法，以区分直接和间接影响。作为对PA-03-044“风险 精神病理学因素使用现有的数据集”，我们建议评估的直接和间接影响 激素浓度对青春期过渡期物质使用风险的影响， 来自NIH资助的研究（5 R 01 MH 058393 -03）。我们的新分析方法是一种综合和 两种先进的统计技术的扩展，以纠正测量误差， 青春期和评估的直接和间接影响的基础上统计因果推理。我们的目标是：（1） 评估激素浓度对青春期物质使用风险的直接和间接影响 使用现有方法和新方法进行过渡，并比较两者的结果。(2)建设一支能处理 准确和信息丰富的方法和计算工具，用于模拟青春期成熟过程， 通过贝叶斯方法校正测量误差。(3)为了扩展我们的广义中介模型 用于评估直接和间接中介效应，考虑潜在中介和/或潜在结果 变量拟议的工作在药物使用和统计应用领域都具有创新性。的 这项研究有望填补青少年早期发育物质使用的知识空白， 物质使用和滥用风险之间的途径以及青春期过渡期间激素的上升。它 也将有助于纵向青春期成熟过程建模的统计文献， 复杂的中介机制。

The pubertal transition represents one of the most critical periods for the development of psychopathology and risk for later substance use due to extensive and simultaneous hormonal, physical, and social-role changes occurring during this period. Current developmental theories suggest that hormone concentrations have a direct neurochemical effect and indirect psychosocial effect on risk behavior during the pubertal transition. Assessing these direct and indirect effects will provide critical knowledge for constructing effective early substance use prevention or intervention approaches for children and adolescents. However, such knowledge is lacking due to (a) measurement error in characterization of puberty and (b) lack of adequate statistical methodology to differentiate direct and indirect effects. In response to the PA-03-044, "Risk Factors of Psychopathology Using Existing Data Sets", we propose to assess the direct and indirect effects of hormone concentrations on substance use risk during the pubertal transitional period using an exceptional datasetfrom an NIH-funded study (5R01MH058393-03). Our novel analytical approach is a synthesis and extension of two advanced statistical techniques in order to both correct for the measurement error in puberty and to assess the direct and indirect effects based on statistical causal inference. Our aims are:(1) To assess direct and indirect effects of hormone concentrations on substance use risk during the pubertal transition using existing and new methods and to compare the results from both. (2) To develop a more accurate and informative method and a computational tool for modeling the pubertal maturation process and correcting for measurement error via a Bayesian approach. (3) To extend our generalized mediational model for assessing direct and indirect mediational effects considering latent mediator and/or latent outcome variables. The proposed work is innovative both in the field of substance use and statistical application. The study is expected to fill the gap of knowledge in early adolescent developmental substance use by examining pathways between substance use and abuse risk and the rise of hormones during the pubertal transition. It will also contribute to the statistical literature on modeling longitudinal pubertal maturational process and complex mediating mechanisms.