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. 2018 Aug 27;15(9):1842.
doi: 10.3390/ijerph15091842.

Prevailing over Adversity: Factors Counteracting the Long-Term Negative Health Influences of Social and Material Disadvantages in Youth

Ylva B Almquist  1 , Evelina Landstedt  2 , Josephine Jackisch  3 , Kristiina Rajaleid  4 , Hugo Westerlund  5 , Anne Hammarström  6
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Prevailing over Adversity: Factors Counteracting the Long-Term Negative Health Influences of Social and Material Disadvantages in Youth

Ylva B Almquist et al. Int J Environ Res Public Health. .

Abstract

Disadvantaged circumstances in youth tend to translate into poor health development. However, the fact that this is not always the case has been seen as indicative of differential resilience. The current study highlights factors outside the context of the family with the potential to counteract the long-term negative influences of social and material adversity in adolescence on general health status. This study was based on two waves of questionnaire data from the Northern Swedish Cohort. From the wave in 1981 (age 16), indicators of social and material conditions as well as factors related to school, peers, and spare time were derived. From the wave in 2008 (age 43), information about self-rated health was used. Ordinal logistic regression models (n = 908) showed that adversity in youth was associated with poorer self-rated health in midlife among men and women alike, net of health status at baseline. However, having an advantaged situation with regard to school, peers, or spare time appeared to protect against the detrimental influences of disadvantaged circumstances in the family context on subsequent health. This suggests that health-promoting interventions may benefit from focusing on contexts outside the family in their effort to strengthen processes of resilience among disadvantaged youths.

Keywords: disadvantages; living conditions; longitudinal; resilience; self-rated health; youth.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Associations between social and material adversity (ranging between 0 and 6) at T1 (age 16) and self-rated health at T2 (age 43), stratified by (the absence or presence of) each separate protective factor at T1. Results from ordinal regression analysis, presented as odds ratios with 95% confidence intervals (n = 908). Adjusted for gender, internalising symptoms, and functional somatic symptoms at baseline. The outcome, self-rated health (ranging between 1 and 3), is coded so that higher vales indicate poorer health.
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