“Toxic” schools? How school exposures during adolescence influence trajectories of health through young adulthood

Abstract

A large body of research identifies the critical role of early-life social contexts such as neighborhoods and households in shaping life course trajectories of health. Less is known about whether and how school characteristics affect individual health and contribute to population health inequality. However, recent scholarship argues that some school environments are so stressful due to high levels of violence, disorder, and poverty that they may be “toxic” to student health, but this hypothesis has not been tested using population data. Integrating insights from the life course perspective and stress process model, we use rich longitudinal data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (n = 11,382), diverse markers of physiological functioning and psychological well-being, and multilevel regression models to examine whether and how school characteristics shape trajectories of physiological dysregulation and depressive risk from adolescence through early adulthood. Findings reveal that, across multiple measures of physiological functioning and psychological well-being, the social and structural characteristics of schools play an essential role in shaping health risk from adolescence through young adulthood—long after students left school. In particular, indicators of school-level violence and perceptions of safety and school social disconnectedness had especially strong associations with health risk in both the short- and long-term. School socioeconomic composition was also strongly associated with physiological dysregulation in young adulthood, net of individual and neighborhood socioeconomic exposures. Together, findings from this study suggest that school environments can serve as early-life stressors in the lives of young people that unequally shape health trajectories and contribute to broader patterns of health inequality.

Evidence of Gender Violence Negative Impact on Health as a Lever to Change Adolescents’ Attitudes and Preferences towards Dominant Traditional Masculinities

“…However, emerging research in this field supports the extension of this model in adolescence [ 9 ]. In this regard, it has been found that violent environments can be toxic for adolescents and create health risks [ 10 ].…”

Sociodemographic Correlates of Contemporary Screen Time Use among 9- and 10-Year-Old Children

“…Together, these factors may lead to the elevated screen time burden experienced by youth from these communities. [21][22][23][24][25] Children from lower socio-economic backgrounds are more likely to have screens (e.g. television, video games) in their bedrooms and decreased accessibility to opportunities for physical activity or sport than those from higher socioeconomic backgrounds, and these factors jointly increase their daily screen time.…”

Racial/ethnic disparities in childhood obesity: The role of school segregation

“…A nationally representative study documented that disparities in physical activity levels among Hispanic and Black adolescents compared with White for the characteristics of the schools they attended, including racial composition and economic resources (23). These mechanisms are part of a broader constellation of differences in material and social characteristics across levels of school segregation (16,19,22,(26)(27)(28)30,42,43), including exposure to violence, a barrier to physical activity (29). Identifying place-based mechanisms linking school racial/ ethnic segregation to child obesity disparities is critical for the design of interventions to advance health equity beginning in childhood (18).…”