Document text
Principal Investigator: Alison Cohen
Organization: FORDHAM UNIVERSITY
Fiscal Year: 2024
Award: $597,445
Funding agency: National Heart Lung and Blood Institute
Emerging adulthood represents a uniquely sensitive period for studying social determinants of health in the
United States (US), as young people begin to establish their own paths towards higher education, careers, and
financial independence. College, specifically, is a time of changing socioeconomic position (SEP) that is not
often clearly captured in health research, despite strong ties between SEP and health. Over 40% of all young
adults aged 18-24 are enrolled as full-time college students in the US, and they increasingly represent the
diversity of the country in terms of SEP, race, and ethnicity, particularly colleges classified as Hispanic-Serving
Institutions (HSIs). (The 539 HSIs in the US serve over two-thirds of all Latinx, 40% of all Asian, and 22% of all
Black college students in the US.) Despite perceptions that emerging adult college students are at the peak of
health, over one-third of college students report being overweight or obese, and the incidence of
cardiovascular disease outcomes among young adults has been an increasing cause of concern. This risk is
exacerbated for low-SEP students, and students of color, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic began.
Therefore, emerging adult college students are a priority population to promote cardiovascular health, and
reduce health disparities, before the onset of chronic disease. The proposed longitudinal research addresses
these important scientific gaps by creating and studying a de novo, longitudinal cohort of 4,000 racially,
ethnically, and socioeconomically diverse young adult college students recruited as first-year students from two
HSIs in California and followed over three years, including if they leave college. The study will incorporate
anthropometric, institutional administrative, smartphone, behavioral, and self-reported data. The specific aims
are: (1) To determine the contribution of emerging adults’ economic stressors (e.g.,income, wealth, financial
stress, basic needs, residential environment, subjective social status) to cardiometabolic health outcomes
(e.g., weight-related measures, blood pressure) over time; (2) To determine the contribution of educational
protective factors (e.g., use of social supports, academic supports, basic needs supports) to cardiometabolic
health outcomes over time; (3) examine weight-related behaviors (i.e., sleep, physical activity, diet, disordered
eating, smoking) as mechanisms of associations between economic stress, educational protective factors, and
cardiometabolic health. This large, diverse sample will have sufficient statistical power to examine how
racialized and gendered identities may modify associations between economic and educational exposures and
cardiometabolic outcomes, which will help increase understanding of the complex interplay between different
social determinants of health and help inform potential interventions to reduce health disparities. Identifying risk
and protective factors that could affect weight and blood pressure among diverse emerging adult college
students can help inform novel interventions and support services to promote cardiometabolic health in a
significant portion of the young adult population.
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