P3B148: Material Hardship and Telomere Length in Children

Background: Telomeres are protective sequences at the ends of chromosomes that shorten with age. The accelerated shortening of telomeres has been associated with chronic stress and adverse health outcomes. Therefore, researchers use telomere length (TL) as a biomarker of stress exposure; previous research has subsequently documented an association between childhood stress specifically and shorter TL. For families, economic stressors include material hardship, the inability to meet basic needs. Material hardship has been associated with poor physical health and behavioral problems, but there is not a clearly defined relationship between material hardship and TL as a biomarker of stress. Our goal was to examine the hypothesis that material hardship across potentially sensitive life course periods, infancy and toddlerhood, childhood, and adolescence, is associated with shorter salivary TL (sTL) in childhood and adolescence.

Methods: The data comes from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS). The FFCWS is an optimal source to study material hardship because it oversamples children born to unmarried parents who are disproportionately from low-income, single-parent, and racially or ethnically diverse families. The principal measures utilized in the ordinary least squares regression analyses are mother or primary caregiver reports of material hardship measured during three life course stages and sTL at years 9 (n=1,990) and 15 (n=1,874). The analyses controlled for a multitude of family and individual characteristics that are likely to affect both material hardship and sTL.

Results: At year 9, material hardship experienced during both infancy and toddlerhood (p < 0.05) and childhood (p < 0.01) is associated with significantly shorter sTL (Table 1). In addition, a cumulative measure of material hardship experienced before year 9 is associated with shorter sTL at year 9 (p < 0.01). At year 15, only material hardship experienced during infancy and toddlerhood is associated with shorter sTL (p < 0.01) (Table 2).

Conclusion: The study finds that material hardship experienced during infancy and toddlerhood is significantly associated with shorter sTL in both children and adolescents, a conclusion that is consistent with previous literature pointing to material hardship being a key source of stress for families. The study suggests that the timing of hardship does matter with relation to sTL and points to infancy and toddlerhood specifically as a sensitive period with respect to the influence of stress on TL. In the future, basic biological research examining the mechanism of apparent TL attrition with chronic stress is critical before studies can draw causal relationships between material hardship and TL. Studies should focus on factors that fashion telomere length at birth and telomere attrition dynamics during early life. In addition, future research should utilize longitudinal analyses to study telomere attrition across the life course.