The candidate requests a five-year Mentored Career Development Award (K01) for training in the study of substance use and related problem behaviors in adolescence and emerging adulthood, and their relation to trajectories of adverse experiences in childhood (e.g., maltreatment, violence exposure, parental substance use). The candidate will also gain skills in the application of growth mixture models and other sophisticated latent variable techniques with large, multi-site, longitudinal datasets. The candidate's long-term goal is to integrate this training with her previous experience studying the childhood effects of maltreatment and violence exposure. Training includes coursework and close mentoring with experts in adolescence and emerging adulthood, substance use, problem behaviors, maltreatment, childhood adversity, and longitudinal latent variable analyses. The primary research goal is to examine pathways from multiple forms of maltreatment and co-occurring childhood adversities to subsequent substance use and problem behaviors (i.e., delinquency and sexual risk behaviors) using data from the five-site Consortium of Longitudinal Studies of Child Abuse and Neglect (LONGSCAN;total N = 1,354). Data from multiple informants collected every two years between the ages of 4 and 18 will be used to build growth mixture models to identify different trajectories of childhood adversity and adolescent substance use, delinquency, and sexual risk behaviors, and examine whether these trajectories are associated with one another. Once heterogeneity in trajectories has been modeled, mediating mechanisms for identified subgroups will be explored. Analyses will also explore the effects on results of using different measures of maltreatment and violence exposure (i.e., prospective county reports, retrospective self-report, and caregiver report). Child ethnicity, gender, and behavioral characteristics will also be examined as potential moderators of hypothesized relations. Proposed activities will inform development of an R01 proposal to follow the San Diego sample (n=330) into adulthood. Results will provide new information on longitudinal patterns of multiple adverse experiences and their relation to adolescent substance use and related problems. This knowledge will inform prevention efforts by increasing our knowledge of the role of specific dimensions of maltreatment and co-occurring adversities in the onset and development of adolescent substance use, delinquency, and sexual risk behavior.
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