Late Adolescent Adverse Social Environments Contribute to Young Adult Physical Health and Functioning. Elenda T. Hessel, Emily L. Loeb, Jospeh S. Tan, Megan M. Schad, & Joseph P. Allen University of Virginia. We would like to thank the National Institute of Child Health & Human Development for funding awarded to Joseph P. Allen, Principal Investigator, (R01 HD & R01-MH58066) for funding to conduct this study as well as for the write-up of this study. Introduction Premises Adult social functioning has been linked concurrently with physical health, including sleep quality, cardiovascular reactivity to stress, and body mass index. A wealth of research has demonstrated that social functioning in adolescence may predict adulthood functioning. As such, it is possible that some of the roots of adult physical health may also be found in adolescent social environments. Already, researchers have been able to predict self-rated health status at age 26 from childhood loneliness, strengthening the possibility that earlier social factors may predict adult health. Both hostile relationships and loneliness have been associated with maladaptive physical outcomes, suggesting that adverse social environments may place individuals at risk for health difficulties. This study seeks to investigate the role adolescent social environments, including peer, parental, and neighborhood environments play in predicting self-rated global health outcomes. Hypotheses. Adverse social environments at age 17, as indexed by aggressive close peers, poor quality inter-parental relationships, and low-quality neighborhoods will predict poorer physical health outcomes in early adulthood at age 25, including increased role limitations and social functioning due to physical health and increased fatigue. Method Conclusions Results Participants Multi-method longitudinal data were obtained from 184 teenagers along with their closest peer and their parents at age 18, and again from the target teens at age % Caucasian, 29% African American, and 13% Mixed or Other ethnicity. Median household income was within the $40,000 to $59,000 range. Target teen mean age was years at Time 1, at Time 2, and at Time 3. Procedures. Time 1 (Age 17) – Closest peer of target teen filled out a questionnaire about their attitudes towards aggression, and target teen’s mother filled out questionnaires reporting on their satisfaction in their romantic relationship and the quality of their neighborhood. Procedures (Cont.) Time 2 (Age 25) - Target teen filled out a questionnaire reporting on their own physical health and functioning. Measures. Close Peer Aggressive Attitudes (Target teen age 17) Friend self-reported attitudes towards aggression were assessed using the Adolescent Attitudes Questionnaire (Guerra, 1986; Slaby & Guerra, 1988). Sample Item: “It’s okay to hit someone if you think he or she deserves it”. Maternal Romantic Relationship Satisfaction (Target teen age 17) Mother’s report of romantic relationship satisfaction was assessed using the Dyadic Satisfaction subscale of the Dyadic Adjustment Scale (Spanier, 1976). Sample Item: “How often do you and your partner quarrel?”. Neighborhood Quality (Target teen age 17) Mother’s report of neighborhood cohesiveness and neighborhood crime and deterioration were assessed using a questionnaire created for the present study (Allen et. al., unpublished manuscript). Sample Cohesiveness item: “I believe most of my neighbors would help me in an emergency.” Sample Crime and Deterioration item: “There are people in my neighborhood who sell drugs”. Self-Reported Health (Target teen age 25) Target teens self-reported health was assessed the RAND-36 (Ware, & Sherbourne, 1992). The Role Limitations due to Physical Health, Social Functioning and Fatigue subscales were used. Items assessed individuals perceptions of the degree to which they felt they were limited by their health in the performance of roles including social roles and their fatigue. These results indicate that exposure to adverse or risky social environments, and in particular exposure to aggressive peers, dissatisfaction in familial relationships, and less safe neighborhoods, may put adolescents at risk for diminished functioning due to physical health difficulties in adulthood. Exposure to these risky environments may leave adolescents lacking in social support from friends, parents, and neighbors, and may result in them carrying an increased emotional and sometimes practical load. This could impact physical health directly, by altering sleep and cardiovascular functioning, or indirectly, by reducing time for self-care, and increasing the likelihood of poor health. Though further research is needed to elucidate mediators and moderators, this may have implications for prevention efforts. More role limitations were experienced due to physical health issues in early adulthood for adolescents who had friends who endorsed aggressive attitudes (β=.22, p<.05). More impairment in social functioning due to physical health was experienced by teens whose friends reported aggressive attitudes, whose mothers reported dissatisfaction in romantic relationships, and whose neighborhoods during adolescence were less cohesive and had more deterioration and crime (Tables 1-1 and 1-2) More fatigue during early adulthood was predicted by less maternal relationship satisfaction, neighborhood connectedness, and neighborhood cohesion during adolescence (Table 2). Thoughts? Questions? Ideas? Elie Hessel at