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The Social Ecology of Adolescent Obesity: Defining the Role of Adverse Social Settings and Social Stress

William T. Grant Scholars
July 2008
June 2013
$350,000
Renee Boynton-Jarrett
Boston Medical Center, Boston University School of Medicine
How does neighborhood and family violence affect risk for adolescent obesity? Over the past two decades, the level of exposure to violence among youth and rates of childhood and adolescent obesity have increased. These two phenomena may be related. The alarming rise in the prevalence of obesity among children and adults in the past twenty years suggests that environmental and behavioral influences may be fueling the present epidemic. As a result, researchers have begun to move beyond the individual to investigate contributing factors at contextual levels. Boynton-Jarrett will use this William T. Grant Scholar award to: (1) investigate the role of neighborhood and familial violence in explaining the social inequalities in obesity risk during adolescence; (2) explore pathways through which neighborhood and family violence may impact change in body mass index over time; (3) use preceding work to develop a pilot intervention. First, Boynton-Jarrett will evaluate the impact of timing and chronicity of exposure to parental domestic violence on obesity risk during adolescence among youth in the Growing Up Today Study (GUTS). She will then use multilevel modeling to investigate the relative contribution of neighborhood violence on change in BMI over time while controlling for individual self-report of violence exposure in the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN). The last part of the project will involve in-depth, qualitative interviews with youth ages 8–12 and their families to develop a pilot intervention.
Focus Areas of this Grant
8 - 21
Male, Female
Rural, Suburban, Urban
American Indian and Alaska Native, Asian, Black or African American, Latino or Hispanic, White, Other Race/Ethnicity
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