Do Religiosity and Spirituality Modify the Association Between Adverse Childhood Experiences and Preterm Delivery? A latent class moderation analysis

Citation

Zamani-Hank, Yasamean; Brincks, Ahnalee; Talge, Nicole; Slaughter-Acey, Jaime; & Margerison, Claire (2023). Do Religiosity and Spirituality Modify the Association Between Adverse Childhood Experiences and Preterm Delivery? A latent class moderation analysis. Society for Pediatric and Perinatal Epidemiologic Research (SPER) Annual Conference. Portland, OR.

Abstract

Religiosity (R) and spirituality (S) have been identified as potential protective factors that may buffer against life stressors to promote positive pregnancy outcomes. No studies to date have evaluated the relationship between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), R, S, and preterm delivery (PTD). Using a latent class moderation analysis, we evaluated whether R and S modified the relationship between membership in two identified latent classes of women (high ACE prevalence class vs. low ACE prevalence class) and preterm delivery among a sample of n=3,884 women from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (1994-2018) who had a pregnancy that ended in a live birth. Data on six ACEs (sexual, physical, and emotional abuse; neglect, family member suicide attempt or death, foster care placement), PTD, R, S, and race were collected via self-report. A composite childhood SES construct included parental occupation and education, family income, and public assistance receipt. A Wald test was conducted to assess whether R and S modified the relationship between the two latent classes and PTD in the overall sample and in stratified analyses by race and SES. We found that neither R or S modified the association between latent class membership and odds of PTD for the majority of race and SES subgroups (p>.05, respectively). However, in the overall sample, we found that among women with high levels of religiosity, the odds of PTD were higher in the high ACE vs. low ACE class (OR 3.4, 95% 1.2-9.7). Similarly, among women with high levels of spirituality, the odds of PTD were higher in the high ACE vs. low ACE class (OR 3.4, 95% CI 1.4-8.4). These results indicate that R and S may be protective against PTD for women with a lower prevalence of ACEs but not for women with higher prevalence of ACEs. These findings suggest that R and S may not operate equally for all women in all contexts of adversity, highlighting the need to consider adversity thresholds.

URL

https://sper.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/SPER-Program-060223.pdf

Reference Type

Conference proceeding

Book Title

Society for Pediatric and Perinatal Epidemiologic Research (SPER) Annual Conference

Author(s)

Zamani-Hank, Yasamean
Brincks, Ahnalee
Talge, Nicole
Slaughter-Acey, Jaime
Margerison, Claire

Year Published

2023

City of Publication

Portland, OR

Reference ID

10280