Neighborhood Context, Social Relationships, and Health: Examining the Pathways

描述(由申请人提供)：这个独立之路奖的主要目的是提供必要的培训和研究经验，以促进PI过渡到 在健康和老龄化领域的独立研究生涯。PI是一位训练有素的社会学家和人口学家，正在南加州大学Andrus老年学中心寻求额外的生物学和心理学培训，Andrus老年学中心是致力于研究老龄化的卓越研究机构。PI将开展一项培训和研究计划，将在PI目前在人口健康研究方面的专业知识的基础上，增加有关衰老生物学和心理模型的必要知识。这个奖项的目的是通过阐明社区环境和心理社会因素之间的复杂联系以及它们在整个生命过程中对健康的影响，来扩大现有的关于社会环境是如何“深入”并影响健康的知识。然而，要了解社会环境中的经历如何转化为健康风险，需要澄清将社会环境与健康联系起来的生物和心理社会过程。基于社区的社会参与(例如，与邻居的互动和参与社区组织)可能是社区影响老年人健康的一个关键的、但尚未得到充分研究的途径。本研究旨在探讨社区的社会物理环境、社会参与和多系统生理功能的生物标记物之间的联系，以期对社区环境影响居民，尤其是老年居民的健康和功能的具体途径有新的认识。这项应用意义重大，因为社区在塑造健康和福祉方面发挥着至关重要的作用，特别是在老年人中，他们可能会更加依赖附近社区的资源和便利设施，并更容易受到社区危害的影响。然而，老年人之间将社区与健康联系起来的途径还没有被很好地理解。这个项目的目的是：1)确定将社区与生理失调联系起来的心理社会途径；2)测试个体和社区特征之间的相互作用，以了解它们对心理社会功能和生理失调的影响；以及3)确定社区变化是否预示着个体心理社会功能和生理失调的变化。这个项目将促进对老龄化经验复杂的、多层次的决定因素的理解。研究目标将通过二次数据分析计划与几个现有的基于人群的数据集(芝加哥社区成人健康研究、健康和退休研究以及美国全国中年发展调查)进行调查，所有这些数据集都整合了社区环境、心理社会因素和生物标记物的信息。将结合使用广义线性模型和多层次方法来进行具体目标中概述的分析。了解生物心理社会过程如何将社区和社会参与与健康联系起来所需的技能，这是本次研究所必需的，将作为K99指导计划的关键组成部分获得。应聘者将利用南加州大学安德鲁斯老年学中心和其他地方的广泛资源和培训机会，获得必要的技能，以追求将社区、心理社会因素和生物疾病过程的多层次信息整合到健康和老龄化研究的现有研究模型中的研究职业生涯，这些研究模型传统上完全专注于个人水平的因素。R00阶段将允许候选人在候选人的K99导师的指导下完成研究计划所需的时间，并提交R01申请，以研究邻里环境和社会关系如何结合和相互作用，以塑造生命过程中的健康轨迹。 公共卫生相关性：延长健康、活跃的寿命已成为国家老龄研究所的首要任务。提出的研究将提供新的见解 社区成年人健康老龄化的多层次决定因素可用于：1)改善老龄人口健康的未来研究；以及2)设计促进独立、积极和参与生活的老年友好型社区的政策。这项研究还将提供与健康人2010(2020)目标之一相关的新信息，创造促进所有人健康的社会和自然环境，从而具有超越人口老龄化的公共卫生意义。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This primary aim of this Pathway to Independence Award is to provide necessary training and research experience to facilitate the PI's transition to an independent research career in the field of health and aging. The PI is a highly training sociologist and demographer seeking additional training in biology and psychology at the Andrus Gerontology Center at the University of Southern California, a preeminent research institute devoted to the study of aging. The PI will pursue a program of training and research that will add necessary knowledge of biological and psychological models of aging to the PI's current expertise in demographic health research. The objective of this award is to extend existing knowledge of how social environments 'get under the skin' and influence health by elucidating the complex associations between the neighborhood environment and psychosocial factors and their effects on health across the life course. Understanding how experiences in the social environment are translated into health risks, however, requires clarification of the biological and psychosocial processes that link social environments to health. Neighborhood-based social engagement (e.g. interactions with neighbors and participation in community organization) may represent a key, yet understudied, pathway through which neighborhoods influence older adult health. The proposed research examines the links among the neighborhood social and physical environment, social engagement, and biological markers of multi-system physiological functioning with the objective of gaining new knowledge about the specific pathways through which the neighborhood environment influences health and functioning among residents, and in particular, older residents. The application is highly significant because communities play a vital role in shaping health and well-being, particularly among older adults who may be- come more dependent on the resources and amenities in their immediate neighborhood and have greater exposure and vulnerability to neighborhood hazards. Yet, the pathways linking neighborhoods to health among older adults are not well understood. The aims of this project are to: 1) identify the psychosocial pathways linking neighborhoods to physiological dysregulation; 2) test for interactions between individual and neighborhood characteristics with respect to their effects on psychosocial functioning and physiological dysregulation; and 3) determine if neighborhood change predicts change in individual psychosocial functioning and physiological dysregulation. This project will advance understanding of the complex, multilevel determinants of the aging experience. The research objectives will be investigated through a program of secondary data analysis with several existing population-based data sets (Chicago Community Adult Health Study, Health and Retirement Study, and National Survey of Midlife Development in the U.S.), all of which integrate information on neighborhood con- text, psychosocial factors, and biomarkers. A combination of generalized linear models and multilevel methods will be used to conduct the analyses outlined in the specific aims. The skills needed to understand how biopsychosocial processes link neighborhoods and social engagement to health, which is necessary for this re- search, will be obtained as a key component of the K99 mentoring plan. The candidate will draw on a broad range of resources and training opportunities throughout the University of Southern California Andrus Gerontology Center and elsewhere to obtain the necessary skills to pursue a research career that integrates multi- level information on neighborhoods, psychosocial factors, and biological disease processes into existing re- search models in health and aging research that have traditionally focused entirely on individual-level factors. The R00 phase will allow the candidate the time needed to complete the research plan under the guidance of the candidate's K99 mentors, and to submit an R01 application to examine how the neighborhood environment and social relationships combine and interact to shape health trajectories over the life course. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Extending healthy, active years of life has become a top priority of the National Institute on Aging. The pro- posed research will provide new insights into the multilevel determinants of healthy aging among community- dwelling adults that can be used to inform: 1) future research on improving the health of the aging population; and 2) policies for designing age-friendly communities that promote independent, active, and engaged living. This research will also will contribute new information relevant to one of the goals of Healthy People 2010 (2020), creating social and physical environments that promote good health for all, and thus has public health significance beyond aging populations.