Social class differences in mortality, morbidity and health functioning persist in the United States, the United Kingdom and other industrialized countries. Indeed, they may be widening for mortality. Such socioeconomic status (SES) gradients in health are present throughout the lifespan persisting into the eighth decade. Changes of health with age are heterogeneous with important environmental determinants, which include SES. This project will determine patterns and determinants of change of health in relation to age and SES. Further, it will examine whether the causes and consequences of within-person changes of health with age are different from those of a single measure. In the British civil service there is an unexplained threefold higher mortality from cardiovascular disease (CVD) in the lowest compared to the highest employment grade. The broad long term objective of the Whitehall II study is to explain the socioeconomic differences in health. With the help of NIH support, the Whitehall II study of 10,308 male and female civil servants, aged 35-55 years at entry (1985-88) was established to examine the role of specific psychosocial, lifestyle, biochemical and physiological factors as possible explanations of these inequalities. True age related changes in these exposures and/or cumulative exposure measured longitudinally are hypothesized to predict changes in SES differences in health with age. Support is requested to address the following aims: 1) to describe and explain patterns of change with age in health status in relation to SES; 2) to examine potential biochemical mediators of the relation between SES, psychosocial factors and CVD; and 3) to examine the relationship between SES and change in cognitive function with age. The Whitehall II study is uniquely poised to address these questions, offering: civil service grade as an excellent measure of SES; longitudinal design with participants comparatively young at entry, allowing the detection of antecedents of change; a wide range of exposure data; repeated measures of exposures and outcomes; substantial power to detect age-related change and its interaction with SES; wide range of health outcomes including health and cognitive functioning, components of the metabolic syndrome, mortality, non-fatal diagnoses and sickness absence. This proposal requests support for data collection only, to repeat outcome measures of health functioning, cognitive functioning and components of the metabolic syndrome.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute on Aging (NIA)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
5R01AG013196-02
Application #
2390083
Study Section
Behavioral Medicine Study Section (BEM)
Project Start
1996-04-01
Project End
1999-03-31
Budget Start
1997-05-01
Budget End
1998-03-31
Support Year
2
Fiscal Year
1997
Total Cost
Indirect Cost
Name
University of London Institute of Neurology
Department
Type
DUNS #
City
London
State
Country
United Kingdom
Zip Code
Mein, Gill; Grant, Robert (2018) A cross-sectional exploratory analysis between pet ownership, sleep, exercise, health and neighbourhood perceptions: the Whitehall II cohort study. BMC Geriatr 18:176
Fleischmann, Maria; Carr, Ewan; Stansfeld, Stephen A et al. (2018) Can favourable psychosocial working conditions in midlife moderate the risk of work exit for chronically ill workers? A 20-year follow-up of the Whitehall II study. Occup Environ Med 75:183-190
Akbaraly, Tasnime; Sexton, Claire; Zsoldos, Enik? et al. (2018) Association of Long-Term Diet Quality with Hippocampal Volume: Longitudinal Cohort Study. Am J Med 131:1372-1381.e4
Abell, Jessica G; Kivimäki, Mika; Dugravot, Aline et al. (2018) Association between systolic blood pressure and dementia in the Whitehall II cohort study: role of age, duration, and threshold used to define hypertension. Eur Heart J 39:3119-3125
Carr, Ewan; Fleischmann, Maria; Goldberg, Marcel et al. (2018) Occupational and educational inequalities in exit from employment at older ages: evidence from seven prospective cohorts. Occup Environ Med 75:369-377
Knott, Craig S; Bell, Steven; Britton, Annie (2018) The stability of baseline-defined categories of alcohol consumption during the adult life-course: a 28-year prospective cohort study. Addiction 113:34-43
D'Hooge, Lorenzo; Achterberg, Peter; Reeskens, Tim (2018) Mind over matter. The impact of subjective social status on health outcomes and health behaviors. PLoS One 13:e0202489
Valkanova, Vyara; Esser, Patrick; Demnitz, Naiara et al. (2018) Association between gait and cognition in an elderly population based sample. Gait Posture 65:240-245
Magnusson Hanson, Linda L; Westerlund, Hugo; Chungkham, Holendro S et al. (2018) Job strain and loss of healthy life years between ages 50 and 75 by sex and occupational position: analyses of 64 934 individuals from four prospective cohort studies. Occup Environ Med 75:486-493
Singh-Manoux, Archana; Dugravot, Aline; Shipley, Martin et al. (2018) Obesity trajectories and risk of dementia: 28 years of follow-up in the Whitehall II Study. Alzheimers Dement 14:178-186

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