Add Health is excited to announce the following data are now available:
Wave VI Inflammation and Immune Function: This file contains constructed measures designed to facilitate analysis and interpretation of inflammation and immune function based on venous blood collected via phlebotomy at the Wave VI home exam. Assay results include High Sensitivity C-Reactive Protein (hsCRP) and several cytokines (IL-1β, IL-6, IL-8, IL-10, TNFα). In addition, there are constructed measures for counts of subclinical symptoms and common infectious or inflammatory diseases, concentration flags for all cytokines, as well as various anti-inflammatory medication use flags.
The following additional data are also available:
Altitude & Solar Irradiation: These data include elevation and quarterly measures of solar irradiance and irradiation at geocoded Add Health respondent addresses.
Meteorology: These data include daily meteorological measures at geocoded Add Health respondent addresses.
For additional recently released datasets, please visit the File Inventory. These data are only available to users with SRW or Home Institution contracts. The files are already available on the SRW and will be available soon to Home Institution users. For more information on the SRW and Home Institution contract options, please visit the Restricted-Use Contract Options page.
Smoking behavior among adolescents is influenced by their social networks. Using data from two high schools with different network structures in Add Health, Wang et al. examine how peer influence spreads and weakens as it moves through friendship networks. By simulating interventions aimed at reducing smoking by targeting different groups of students, the study measures both direct effects on targeted students and indirect spillover effects across the wider network, focusing on how influence decays across multiple degrees of separation and how this depends on network structure and intervention strategy.
Findings reveal how targeting a small share of highly connected students produces the strongest overall impact, with in-degree and eigenvector targeting consistently outperforming random selection, especially at 10-30% coverage. However, benefits level off at higher coverage levels (around 40–50%) due to network saturation, where most individuals have already been reached directly or indirectly. This study highlights the importance that context matters and policies should cater towards the density structure of social networks.
To read the full article, click the link below. For more important findings using Add Health data, visit the Add Health publications page.
Wang C, Butts C, Hipp J, Lakon C. Peer influence decay and behavioral diffusion in adolescent networks: A simulation approach. Science. Published online April 30, 2026. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aea9297
Add Health is pleased to be at the Population Association of America’s Annual Meeting this week. Throughout the conference, researchers using Add Health data will be sharing their work in a wide range of sessions and poster presentations. To view the full list of presentations, please see the link below, or visit the Add Health booth (#209) during exhibit hall hours.
PAA presentations using Add Health Data
The following data is now available from Add Health:
Wave VI Baroreflex Sensitivity and Hemodynamic Recovery
This file contains constructed measures for baroreflex sensitivity, heart rate recovery, and systolic blood pressure recovery for the Wave VI respondents.
Wave VI Home Exam Health & Quality Control Metrics
This file contains data collected during the Wave VI home exam that may be useful to investigators, but that is not included in other Wave VI user guides or codebooks. This data includes respondent provided general health metrics, as well as several measures of quality control related to the home exam. These QC metrics encompass various time intervals dealing with the home exam blood collection, shipping and receiving of blood samples, blood plasma and serum tube conditions, and assay times at the Laboratory for Clinical Biochemistry Research (LCBR).
Wave VI Infection
This file contains constructed measures designed to facilitate analysis and interpretation of infection based on venous blood collection via phlebotomy at the Wave VI home exam. These measures include results for Herpes Simplex Virus (HSV) and Cytomegalovirus (CMV). Several SARV-CoV-2 measures are also described, including Nucleocapsid, Receptor Binding Domain (RBD), and Spike Concentration types.
Wave VI Mover Distance
The dataset provides the distance, in meters, between each respondent’s home residence in each of the previous waves and their Wave VI residence.
Wave I, II, III, IV, V & VI Grouping Data
The dataset contains location identifiers, based on 2020 Census block group FIPS codes, for all six Add Health waves. They are longitudinally consistent across all waves.
For additional recently released datasets, please visit the File Inventory.
These data are only available to users with SRW or Home Institution contracts. The files are already available on the SRW and will be available soon to Home Institution users. For more information on the SRW and Home Institution contract options, please visit the Restricted-Use Contract Options page.
Add Health is pleased to announce the following Wave VI Public-Use Data are now available:
- Mixed-Mode Survey Data
- Data Weights
- Anthropometrics
- Cardiovascular Measures
- Demographics
- Glucose Homeostasis
- Hepatic Injury
- Lipids
- Medications – Home Exam
Public-use data are available from three sources: Add Health Dataverse hosted by UNC’s Research Data Management Core, the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR), and the Association of Religion Data Archives (ARDA). Users may obtain the data from any of these sources, depending on their needs. The public-use data sets contain all the survey data from In-Home Interviews but only for a subset of the full Add Health sample. We release a smaller sample through the public-use data set to limit deductive disclosure risk. Public-use data doesn’t contain ID numbers of friends, siblings or romantic partners, nor does it contain files on genetics, disposition, neighborhood contextual measures, or Add CAPS (Cognitive, Physical, and Sensory) measures.
Recently featured in The New York Times, a study by R.C. Whitaker et al. used Add Health data to examine the link between adolescents’ sense of connection with their families and their social connectedness in adulthood—showcasing the unique value of long-term, longitudinal research. “Two decades of information gives us a greater sense of the truth,” said Dr. David Willis, a professor of pediatrics at Georgetown University who was not involved in the study. “Two decades of information is compelling. It’s a big deal.”
Among 7,018 participants, the researchers found strong, significant positive associations between higher levels of family connection in adolescence and greater social connection in adulthood. Adults who reported the highest levels of family connection during adolescence were more than twice as likely to experience high social connection later in life compared with those who reported the lowest levels. As loneliness and social isolation continue to rise across the United States—along with their negative health impacts—these findings suggest that close-knit, nurturing family environments in childhood may help foster healthier social cohesion and more enduring social relationships in adulthood.
To read the full article, click the link below. For more important findings using Add Health data, visit the Add Health publications page.
Whitaker RC, Dearth-Wesley T, Herman AN, Jordan MC. Family Connection in Adolescence and Social Connection in Adulthood. JAMA Pediatr. Published online January 26, 2026. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2025.5816
Add Health will be at the Population Association of America’s (PAA) Annual Meeting, held May 6–9, 2026, in St. Louis, Missouri. The meeting brings together demographers, social scientists, and health researchers from around the world, offering attendees opportunities to take part in engaging sessions and connect with colleagues. Stop by Add Health booth #209 to speak with project staff, learn about new data releases, and discover more about the study. Staff will be available daily during exhibit hours.
More information can be found at the PAA website. Specific presentations using Add Health data will be listed soon.
Add Health is excited to announce the release of three new biomarker datasets:
- Wave VI Biomarker Weights
- Wave VI Renal Function
- Wave VI Neurodegeneration
In addition, we are releasing two new Mortality Outcomes Surveillance datasets:
- Mortality Outcomes Surveillance: Coroner/Medical Examiner Report Data, 2018 Update
- Mortality Outcomes Surveillance: Death Certificate Data, 2018 Update
For additional recently released datasets, please visit the File Inventory.
Please note that Mortality Outcomes Surveillance: Death Certificate Data, 2018 Update is a Special Request dataset, and is only available to SRW to users who have an existing SRW contract and who have signed the Add Health Data Access Agreement. For more information, please see the requirements for using this dataset.
The three biomarker datasets and the Mortality Outcomes Surveillance: Coroner/Medical Examiner Report Data, 2018 Update data available to users with SRW or Home Institution contracts. The files are already available on the SRW and will be available soon to Home Institution users. For more information on the SRW and Home Institution contract options, please visit the Restricted-Use Contract Options page.
Using nationally representative data from Waves I, II, IV, and V of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health), Dr. Kim et. al. examined the impact of loneliness during adolescence on health and well-being later in adulthood. Loneliness was measured with a survey question asking how often participants felt lonely in the past week, with response options ranging from “never” to “most or all of the time.” Investigators examined whether this loneliness increased between Waves I and II, when participants were approximately 15 years old. Including covariates, researchers assessed over 40 health outcomes in Waves IV and V, when participants were approximately ages 28 and 37, spanning physical health, behavioral health, mental health, social factors, and civic and prosocial behavior.
The research team found that the participants experiencing more loneliness in their adolescent years had worse mental health outcomes, psychological well-being outcomes, and social outcomes but not physical health outcomes, health behavior outcomes or civic and prosocial outcomes. These results suggest that increases in adolescent loneliness are associated with worsened mental and socio-emotional aspects of adult health. However, because follow-up occurred at relatively young adult ages, additional physical health complications may emerge later in life.
To read the full article click the link below. For more important findings using Add Health data, visit the Add Health publications page.
Kim, Eric S., et al. “Loneliness During Adolescence and Subsequent Health and Well-Being in Adulthood: An Outcome-Wide Longitudinal Approach.” Journal of Adolescent Health, vol. 77, no. 1, July 2025, pp. 66-75. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2024.12.011.
Add Health is excited to announce the following data are now available:
Wave V Epigenetic Clocks: Biological aging measures were derived from DNA methylation data for 4,626 unique study participants based on blood collected during the Wave V home exam. The measures include Horvath, PhenoAge, GrimAge, DunedinPACE, Principal Component clocks, and cell type proportion estimates.
For additional recently released datasets, please visit the File Inventory. These data are only available to users with SRW or Home Institution contracts. The files are already available on the SRW and will be available soon to Home Institution users.
For more information on the SRW and Home Institution contract options, please visit the Restricted-Use Contract Options page.
