IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v289y2021ics0277953621007565.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do intersecting identities structure social contexts to influence life course health? The case of school peer economic disadvantage and obesity

Author

Listed:
  • Polos, Jessica
  • Koning, Stephanie
  • McDade, Thomas

Abstract

Scholarship linking social contextual measures to health outcomes has grown in recent decades, but the role of individuals’ intersecting identities in structuring social contexts to influence health remains unclear. Building on an existing intersectionality framework, we conceptualize how this may occur through social relationships. Then, we apply this framework to analyze whether adolescent peer social contextual disadvantage influences life-course obesity heterogeneously by individual gender, race, and early-life income. We take a life course approach as adolescence is a sensitive period for both social development and adult obesity development. In our analysis, we use cohort data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health and leverage quasi-experimental variation in adolescent peers to addresses common sources of bias in prior observational studies. We find that among Black men from lower-income households in adolescence, there is a strong negative relationship between adolescent peer economic disadvantage and adult obesity that strengthens over time. By contrast, among Black women across adolescent household income levels, we find a strong positive relationship between adolescent peer economic disadvantage and obesity that emerges as women leave high school and endures into mid-adulthood. Among non-Black women, a more modest positive relationship appears between peer disadvantage and obesity. Among non-Black men, we find no relationship. These diverging patterns suggest that the pathways through which adolescent peer economic disadvantage influences health may differ or produce differential effects based on intersecting race, gender, and socioeconomic identities. Such heterogenous effects offer new insights, and future directions, for better understanding social life-course determinants of adult health and addressing inequities.

Suggested Citation

  • Polos, Jessica & Koning, Stephanie & McDade, Thomas, 2021. "Do intersecting identities structure social contexts to influence life course health? The case of school peer economic disadvantage and obesity," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 289(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:289:y:2021:i:c:s0277953621007565
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2021.114424
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953621007565
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.socscimed.2021.114424?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jason Fletcher & Jinho Kim & Jenna Nobles & Stephen Ross & Irina Shaorshadze, 2021. "The Effects of Foreign-Born Peers in US High Schools and Middle Schools," Journal of Human Capital, University of Chicago Press, vol. 15(3), pages 432-468.
    2. Mehra, Renee & Boyd, Lisa M. & Ickovics, Jeannette R., 2017. "Racial residential segregation and adverse birth outcomes: A systematic review and meta-analysis," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 191(C), pages 237-250.
    3. Joseph G. Altonji & Todd E. Elder & Christopher R. Taber, 2005. "Selection on Observed and Unobserved Variables: Assessing the Effectiveness of Catholic Schools," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(1), pages 151-184, February.
    4. Cohen-Cole, Ethan & Fletcher, Jason M., 2008. "Is obesity contagious? Social networks vs. environmental factors in the obesity epidemic," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 1382-1387, September.
    5. Jason Fletcher, 2012. "Peer influences on adolescent alcohol consumption: evidence using an instrumental variables/fixed effect approach," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 25(4), pages 1265-1286, October.
    6. Alejandro Gaviria & Steven Raphael, 2001. "School-Based Peer Effects And Juvenile Behavior," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 83(2), pages 257-268, May.
    7. Arcaya, Mariana C. & Tucker-Seeley, Reginald D. & Kim, Rockli & Schnake-Mahl, Alina & So, Marvin & Subramanian, S.V., 2016. "Research on neighborhood effects on health in the United States: A systematic review of study characteristics," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 168(C), pages 16-29.
    8. Yang, Tse-Chuan & South, Scott J., 2018. "Neighborhood effects on body mass: Temporal and spatial dimensions," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 217(C), pages 45-54.
    9. Chang, Virginia W. & Christakis, Nicholas A., 2005. "Income inequality and weight status in US metropolitan areas," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 61(1), pages 83-96, July.
    10. Liu, Hui & Umberson, Debra, 2015. "Gender, stress in childhood and adulthood, and trajectories of change in body mass," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 61-69.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Monocello, Lawrence T. & Dressler, William W., 2022. "Cultural consonance, body image, and disordered eating among young South Korean men," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 314(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Strombotne, Kiersten L. & Fletcher, Jason M. & Schlesinger, Mark J., 2019. "Peer effects of obesity on child body composition," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 49-57.
    2. Ana Balsa & Carlos Díaz, 2018. "Social interactions in health behaviors and conditions," Documentos de Trabajo/Working Papers 1802, Facultad de Ciencias Empresariales y Economia. Universidad de Montevideo..
    3. Paul Frijters & Asad Islam & Chitwan Lalji & Debayan Pakrashi, 2019. "Roommate effects in health outcomes," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(8), pages 998-1034, August.
    4. Ryota Nakamura & Marc Suhrcke & Daniel John Zizzo, 2017. "A triple test for behavioral economics models and public health policy," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 83(4), pages 513-533, December.
    5. Roychowdhury, Punarjit, 2019. "Peer effects in consumption in India: An instrumental variables approach using negative idiosyncratic shocks," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 122-137.
    6. Steven N. Durlauf & Yannis M. Ioannides, 2010. "Social Interactions," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 2(1), pages 451-478, September.
    7. Yakusheva, Olga & Kapinos, Kandice & Weiss, Marianne, 2011. "Peer effects and the Freshman 15: Evidence from a natural experiment," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 9(2), pages 119-132, March.
    8. Halliday, Timothy J. & Kwak, Sally, 2009. "Weight gain in adolescents and their peers," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 181-190, July.
    9. Iryna Topolyan & Xu Xu, 2019. "Beliefs about the Benefits of Breastfeeding: Formation and Effects on Breastfeeding Intention and Persistence," Journal of Interdisciplinary Economics, , vol. 31(2), pages 143-164, July.
    10. Effrosyni Adamopoulou & Ezgi Kaya, 2018. "Young Adults Living with their Parents and the Influence of Peers," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 80(3), pages 689-713, June.
    11. Wang, Haining & Zhu, Rong, 2021. "Social spillovers of China’s left-behind children in the classroom," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    12. Noghanibehambari, Hamid & Engelman, Michal, 2022. "Social insurance programs and later-life mortality: Evidence from new deal relief spending," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(C).
    13. Deconinck, Koen & Swinnen, Johan, 2015. "Peer effects and the rise of beer in Russia," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 83-96.
    14. Paolo Buonanno & Paolo Vanin, 2013. "Bowling alone, drinking together," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 1635-1672, June.
    15. Lin, Xu, 2014. "Peer effects in adolescents' delinquent behaviors: Evidence from a binary choice network model," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 73-92.
    16. Daw, Jonathan & Margolis, Rachel & Verdery, Ashton M., 2015. "Siblings, friends, course-mates, club-mates: How adolescent health behavior homophily varies by race, class, gender, and health status," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 32-39.
    17. Lopez-Mayan, Cristina & Nicodemo, Catia, 2023. "“If my buddies use drugs, will I?” Peer effects on Substance Consumption Among Teenagers," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 50(C).
    18. Patacchini, Eleonora & Bisin, Alberto, 2019. "Dynamic Social Interactions and Health Risk Behavior," CEPR Discussion Papers 13918, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    19. Jason Fletcher & Nicole L. Hair & Barbara L. Wolfe, 2012. "Am I my Brother's Keeper? Sibling Spillover Effects: The Case of Developmental Disabilities and Externalizing Behavior," NBER Working Papers 18279, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    20. Stephen Gibbons & Shqiponja Telhaj, 2016. "Peer Effects: Evidence from Secondary School Transition in England," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 78(4), pages 548-575, August.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:289:y:2021:i:c:s0277953621007565. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.