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Published in

Behavior Genetics (June 2014). doi: 10.1007/s10519-014-9662-x

Abstract:

Simple sequence repeats (SSRs) are one of the earliest available forms of genetic variation available for analysis and have been utilized in studies of neurological, behavioral, and health phenotypes. Although findings from these studies have been suggestive, their interpretation has been complicated by a variety of factors including, among others, limited power due to small sample sizes. The current report details the availability, diversity, and allele and genotype frequencies of six commonly examined SSRs in the ethnically diverse, population-based National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. A total of 106,743 genotypes were generated across 15,140 participants that included four microsatellites and two di-nucleotide repeats in three dopamine genes (DAT1, DRD4, DRD5), the serotonin transporter, and monoamine oxidase A. Allele and genotype frequencies showed a complex pattern and differed significantly between populations. For both di-nucleotide repeats we observed a greater allelic diversity than previously reported. The availability of these six SSRs in a large, ethnically diverse sample with extensive environmental measures assessed longitudinally offers a unique resource for researchers interested in health and behavior.

View or download complete article at Springer Link.

Authors

• Brett C. Haberstick, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• Andrew Smolen, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• Gary L. Stetler, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• Joyce W. Tabor, Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill

• Taylor Roy, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• H. Rick Casey, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• Alicia Pardo, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• Forest Roy, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• Lauren A. Ryals, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• Christina Hewitt, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• Eric A. Whitsel, Department of Epidemiology, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill Gillings School of Global Public Health; Department of Medicine, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill School of Medicine

• Carolyn T. Halpern, Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill; Department of Maternal and Child Health, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill Gillings School of Global Public Health

• Ley A. Killeya-Jones, Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill

• Jeffrey M. Lessem, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• John K. Hewitt, Institute for Behavioral Genetics, University of Colorado Boulder

• Kathleen Mullan Harris, Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill; Department of Sociology, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill

Published in

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

Citation

Hsin A, Xie Y. Explaining Asian Americans’ academic advantage over whites. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 2014 June 10;111(23): 8416-842.  doi: 10.1073/pnas.1406402111

Abstract

The superior academic achievement of Asian Americans is a well-documented phenomenon that lacks a widely accepted explanation. Asian Americans’ advantage in this respect has been attributed to three groups of factors: (i) socio-demographic characteristics, (ii) cognitive ability, and (iii) academic effort as measured by characteristics such as attentiveness and work ethic. We combine data from two nationally representative cohort longitudinal surveys to compare Asian-American and white students in their educational trajectories from kindergarten through high school. We find that the Asian-American educational advantage is attributable mainly to Asian students exerting greater academic effort and not to advantages in tested cognitive abilities or socio-demographics. We test explanations for the Asian–white gap in academic effort and find that the gap can be further attributed to (i) cultural differences in beliefs regarding the connection between effort and achievement and (ii) immigration status. Finally, we highlight the potential psychological and social costs associated with Asian-American achievement success.

View or download complete article at www.pnas.org

Authors

• Amy Hsin, Queens College, City University of New York

• Yu Xie, Institute for Social Research and Department of Sociology, University of Michigan; Center for Social Research, Peking University

2014 Add Health Users Conference

Celebrating 20 Years of Add Health!

We invite you to register for the eleventh Add Health Users Conference to be held on June 26-27, 2014 on the campus of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland.  The principal goal of the conference is to give researchers who are working with data from Add Health an opportunity to share research goals, experiences, and results.  It will also provide an opportunity for those interested in working with the data to learn how they are currently being used by others.  A preliminary agenda will be available online soon!

Conference information and on-line registration are available on the Add Health website.  Please contact Sarah Dean if you have questions.

Restricted-Use Data Dissemination and Contract Administration

The Carolina Population Center (CPC) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH) has resumed Add Health restricted-use data dissemination and contract administration. CPC now oversees the Add Health restricted-use data agreements that are currently in place between data users’ institutions and Data Sharing and Demographic Research at the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR), University of Michigan. To apply for restricted-use data, please download the contract application and return to the Add Health contract administrator.

As a result of the above changes in Add Health restricted-use data dissemination, Add Health Restricted-use Data Agreements with ICPSR will be transferred to CPC on July 1, 2014. Your data use agreement will remain in effect until its current end-date but administration of the agreement will move from ICPSR to CPC.

Effective May 2, 2014, the Data Sharing for Demographic Research (DSDR) project at the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) will no longer accept applications for new restricted-use data contracts (agreements).

Beginning May 5, 2014, the Carolina Population Center will manage all restricted-use data contracts. Please see  here for instructions about applying for restricted-use data.

This month’s speaker is Christine Gray, a doctoral student in the Department of Epidemiology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  She will discuss her Add Health research, “Throwing out the baby with the bathwater? Comparing two approaches to handling implausible values of change in body size”, on Monday, April 21, from 12PM to 1PM in CPC East 405B/C.

Bring your brown bag lunch and join us for the monthly Add Health Data Users Seminar.  This month’s speaker is Dr. Bernard F. Fuemmeler, Associate Professor of Community and Family Medicine, Psychiatry and Behavioral Science, and Psychology and Neuroscience at the Duke University Medical Center.  Dr. Fuemmeler will discuss his recent Add Health publication, “Individual and Community-Level Correlates of Cigarette-Smoking Trajectories from Age 13 to 32 in a U.S. Population-Based Sample”, on Monday, March 24, from 12pm to 1pm in CPC East 405B/C.

Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill observed the apparent occurrence of virgin pregnancy and birth. The research team of Amy H. Herring, Samantha M. Attard, Penny Gordon-Larsen, and Carolyn T. Halpern, with the assistance of Reverend William H. Joyner, analyzed self-reports of pregnancy and sexual initiation. They found that 36 young women who consistently reported having never had sexual intercourse also reported giving birth during the same period. Such “virgin births” were associated with signing chastity pledges and absent or poor parental communication about sex and birth control.

Read the Reuters story here:  Claims of virgin births in U.S. near 1 percent: study (released on December 17, 2013 by Sharon Begley).

Excerpt:  “Of those who said they became pregnant as virgins, 31 percent also said they had signed chastity pledges; 15 percent of nonvirgins who became pregnant said they had signed such pledges, in which a girl vows not to have sex until she marries.

The 45 self-described virgins who reported having become pregnant and the 36 who gave birth were also more likely than nonvirgins to say their parents never or rarely talked to them about sex and birth control. About 28 percent of the “virgin” mothers’ parents (who were also interviewed) indicated they didn’t have enough knowledge to discuss sex and contraception with their daughters, compared to 5 percent of the parents of girls who became pregnant and said they had had intercourse.

The ostensibly chaste mothers were also less likely to know how to use condoms, according to the report. UNC biostatistician Amy Herring and public health expert Carolyn Halpern led the group.”

Amy H. Herring is a Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Department of Biostatistics in the Gillings School of Global Public Health.  Samantha M. Attard is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Carolina Population Center. Penny Gordon-Larsen is a Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Department of Nutrition in the Gillings School of Global Public Health and School of Medicine. William H. Joyner is a reverend at The Chapel of the Cross. Carolyn T. Halpern is a Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Department of Maternal and Child Health in the Gillings School of Global Public Health.

Scholarly source:  Herring AH, Attard SM, Gordon-Larsen P, Joyner WH, and Halpern CT. Like a virgin (mother): analysis of data from a longitudinal, US population representative sample survey. BMJ 2013;347. Article available online.

 

Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, researchers from the University of California Berkeley have discovered a connection between adolescent bedtime and young adult academic performance and emotional distress.  The research team of Lauren D. Asarnow, Eleanor McGlinchey, and Allison G. Harvey found associations between late school year bedtime in adolescence and educational outcomes and emotional distress in young adulthood, and late summer bedtime in adolescence and emotional distress in young adulthood. 

Read the Time story here:  Is Your Teen a Night Owl? That Could Explain His Poor Grades (released on November 14, 2013 by Francine Russo). 

Excerpt:  “The study by University of California Berkeley researchers, published in the Journal of Adolescent Health, compared how the different sleep habits of 2700 teenagers, aged 13 to 18, affected their academic and emotional development. They found that teens who stayed up later than 11:30 pm on school nights — which included 30% of the study subjects — fared worse than early-to-bed kids, and that these consequences lingered six to eight years later, even into college.

Younger students, aged 14-16, suffered both academically and emotionally, says the study’s lead author, Lauren Asarnow, a doctoral student in clinical psychology at UC Berkeley. They had worse cumulative GPA’s at graduation and more emotional distress, as measured by questionnaires post-graduation. The GPAs of the 16-18-year-olds didn’t suffer as much, possibly because they were more used to being sleep-deprived. However, they were more emotionally troubled than their early rising counterparts in college and beyond. They were more likely to report they were ‘sad,’ ‘down,’ or ‘blue,’ and said they cried frequently, or showed other symptoms of depression. ‘It is really important,’ Asarnow says, ‘to get our teens to bed earlier and to start young.’”

Allison G. Harvey is a Professor at the University of California Berkeley’s Department of Psychology. Lauren D. Asarnow is a doctoral student at the University of California Berkeley’s Department of Psychology. Eleanor McGlinchey is affiliated with the University of California Berkeley. 

Scholarly source:  Asarnow LD, M.A., McGlinchey E, Ph.D., and Harvey AG, Ph.D. The effects of bedtime and sleep duration on academic and emotional outcomes in a nationally representative sample of adolescents. Journal of Adolescent Health. In Press. Article available online.

 

Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, researchers from Northwestern University and McGill University have discovered a connection between household financial debt and poor physical and mental health.  The research team of Elizabeth Sweet, Arijit Nandi, Emma K. Adam, and Thomas W. McDade found that young adults aged 24-32 with high debt (individuals would remain in debt even after liquidating all their assets) are more likely to have higher diastolic blood pressure and lower self-reported mental and physical health. 

Read the HuffPost Healthy Living story here:  Debt Linked with High Blood Pressure, Poor Health Among Young Adults: Study (released on August 19, 2013). 

Excerpt:  “’You wouldn’t necessarily expect to see associations between debt and physical health in people who are so young,’ study researcher Elizabeth Sweet, assistant professor of medical social sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, said in a statement. ‘We need to be aware of this association and understand it better. Our study is just a first peek at how debt may impact physical health.’”

Elizabeth Sweet, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Feinberg School of Medicine’s Department of Medical Social Sciences at Northwestern University in Chicago, Illinois.  Arijit Nandi, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Epidemiology, Biostatistics, and Occupation Health and the Institute for Health and Social Policy at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec.  Emma K. Adam, Ph.D., is a Professor of Education and Social Policy at the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University’s School of Education and Social Policy in Evanston, Illinois.  Thomas W. McDade, Ph.D., is a Professor of Anthropology at Northwestern University’s Institute for Policy Research in Evanston, Illinois.

Scholarly source:  Sweet E, Nandi A, Adam EK, and McDade TW. The high price of debt: household financial debt and its impact on mental and physical health. Social Science & Medicine 2013;91:94-100. Article available online.