Socieconomic, sociocultural, and psychosocial factors contribute significantly to cardiovascular disease (CVD) and other health conditions. To date, little research has examined these variables in relation to CVD in Hispanics--the largest and fastest growing ethnic minority population in the U.S. To fully understand CVD and other health issues in Hispanics, additional evidence exploring these associations is needed. The proposed research will examine associations among SES, sociocultural, and psychological risk and protective factors in relation to Metabolic Syndrome (MS;an integrated marker of CVD and Type II diabetes risk) and CVD prevalence in a well-characterized, socieconomically and regionally diverse Hispanic cohort, using a unified conceptual framework. The research will be conducted in a sub-sample of participants from the Hispanic Community Health Study (HCHS)/Study of Latinos (SOL), an epidemiologic study of the prevalence of multiple health conditions and their risk factors, with a special emphasis on CVD. The HCHS/SOL will include 16,000 persons of Cuban, Puerto Rican, Mexican, and Central/South American origin, recruited from four U.S. field centers (San Diego, Miami, Chicago, New York/The Bronx). The HCHS/SOL includes a comprehensive clinical exam, but very limited socioeconomic, sociocultural, and psychological measures. In the proposed research 5280 participants (aged 18-74;1320 per site) will complete a comprehensive interview assessment of these factors, within 6-months of their HCHS/SOL baseline clinic exam. Collected data will then be linked with measures of proposed behavioral pathways (e.g., diet, physical activity, and smoking), the MS, and CVD collected during the baseline HCHS/SOL exam. Structural equation modeling will be used to test theoretically-driven hypotheses concerning associations among socioeconomic, sociocultural, and psychosocial factors, behavioral pathways, and MS and CVD prevalence. Multi-group analyses will examine possible Hispanic subgroup differences. The proposed study will provide a significant complement to the parent HCHS/SOL study, to help achieve the goal of examining varied risk and protective factors in Hispanic health and will provide much needed information on the role of SES, sociocultural and psychosocial factors that can guide future prevention and intervention efforts for the US Hispanic population, and for distinct Hispanic subgroups. The study will capitalize on the tremendous resources and infrastructure available to HCHS/SOL (e.g., effective recruitment strategies;significant progress in data collection;large array of behavioral and clinical data points;diverse investigator expertise) to carry out the proposed aims in a cost-effective, efficient manner. Moreover, the collected data will become a significant resource to future researchers who can address a myriad of research questions regarding psychosocial factors in Hispanic health via the HCHS/SOL dataset in the future.
Little is known about how socioeconomic status (e.g., income), stress, emotions, relationships, and culture affect health in Hispanics. The proposed research will examine how such variables affect CVD and other health risks in a diverse representative group of Hispanics surveyed at four US field centers, thus providing important information about the health of this large and fast growing segment of the US population.
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