Andrew Fuligni - US grants

Despite the dramatic rise in immigration in the past 30 years, virtually nothing is known about how well the children of new immigrants adapt to American society. The project described in this proposal is a longitudinal study of the transition to adulthood among adolescence within families from the largest immigrant groups in the United States: Mexican, Central and South Americans, Filipinos, and Chinese. Youths within native-born families from these groups will also participate in the study, as well those from both immigrant and native-born families with European backgrounds. The main goals of the proposed project are threefold: (1) to assess the educational and occupational attainments of these youths as they make the transition from high school to young adulthood; (2) to examine the roles played in these attainments by both prior and current social and cultural factors, particularly: (a) youths; academic achievement in secondary school; (b) the expectations and support of their families and peers; (c) the youths' own attitudes and behaviors; (d) their use of employment networks within their immigrant communities; and (e) their sense of obligation to their families; and (3) to explore the extent to which youth's ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds moderate the influence of the social and cultural factors on their attainments.

Despite the dramatic rise in immigration in the past 30 years, virtually nothing is known about how well the children of new immigrants adapt to American society. The project described in this proposal is a longitudinal study of the transition to adulthood among adolescence within families from the largest immigrant groups in the United States: Mexican, Central and South Americans, Filipinos, and Chinese. Youths within native-born families from these groups will also participate in the study, as well those from both immigrant and native-born families with European backgrounds. The main goals of the proposed project are threefold: (1) to assess the educational and occupational attainments of these youths as they make the transition from high school to young adulthood; (2) to examine the roles played in these attainments by both prior and current social and cultural factors, particularly: (a) youths; academic achievement in secondary school; (b) the expectations and support of their families and peers; (c) the youths' own attitudes and behaviors; (d) their use of employment networks within their immigrant communities; and (e) their sense of obligation to their families; and (3) to explore the extent to which youth's ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds moderate the influence of the social and cultural factors on their attainments.

Families with Latino backgrounds now represent the largest ethnic minority group in the United States, and adolescents wtihin the$8 families face substantial challenges to their psychological and behavioral adjustment. Emerging evidence indicates that traditional family values and practices may play a critical role in shaping Latino adolescents'risk for a number of problematic outcomes, including externalizing behavior problems, substance use, symptoms of depression and anxiety, and school disengagement and dropout. Family obligation and assistance have been identified as key elements of famHy relationships among famUies with Mexican baCkgrounds, the single largest LaUno ethnic group. Family obligation and assistance also have been shown to be Significant predictOf"S of adolescents'adjustment, induding their involvement in substarx:e use and theil" psychological well being. But ills stlD unclear 'Nhich facets of family obligation and assistance are sources of strength and which are challenges for the adolescents'adjustment. Withoutltlis information, it Is difficult to develop meaningful programs and policies that focus on this growing population of adolescents. The proposed research study fills th is gap in prior research by taking an approach that family membership functions as a social identity for adolescents from Mexican backgrounds, and uses several prInciples of Social Identity Tl1eory in order to address four kay questions: (1) How ara family obligation and assistance socialized within families from Mexican backgrounds?: (2) How does actuallamily assistan~ depend upon the families'daily needs and routines?;(3) How does lamily obligation and assistance impact adolescents'emotional and behavioral adjustment?;and (4) How do the dynamics of family obligation and assistance vary aCCOl"ding 10 characteristics of the adolescents'themselves? The proposed stud~'will address these key questions employing mixed methods, including traditional quantitative interviews, daily diary checktists, and qualitative IntervieWS. The study will take place in the Los Angeles metropolitan area, a primary location of families wilh Mexican backgrounds in the United Slates. A total of 540 adolescents wi! be recruited from the ninth and tenth grades of three high schools. Adolescents and their parents will comptete a personal interview and a fourteen day diary checklist for two consecutive years. In addition, a subset Of 54 families will annually participate in the Ecocultural Family Interview, which is an established qualitative Interview designed to provide a more In-depth view of the dynamics of the socialization, daily manifestation, and developmental implications of family obligation and assistance.

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Despite calls for the identification of early risk factors for the development of chronic health conditions, there has been little longitudinal research on biomarkers of health that has been conducted in persons younger than 25 years of age. In addition, there is only a minimal understanding of how biological indices of early risk for adult health develop among adolescents with Latin American and Asian backgrounds, the two fastest rising ethnic groups in the United States, who are at differential risk for adverse health outcomes as compared to European Americans. An understanding of these processes is necessary for the development of ethnically and culturally relevant prevention efforts. We propose a 3-wave longitudinal study of adolescents and their caregivers from Mexican, Chinese and European backgrounds in order to assess the impact of daily experience on biological indicators of early risk for adult health. Our focus on daily experience stems from the need to identify the mechanisms by which global social factors identified in demographic surveys, such as lower education and income, play themselves out in individuals' daily lives. Daily experiences such as social conflict, excessive demands, emotional distress, threat, and sleep behaviors have been shown to be linked to both global risk factors and multiple biological indices of health risk among adults. The project will include both intensive behavioral assessments and detailed biological markers of health risk from both adolescents and their parents in order to address the following specific aims: (1) describe the development during adolescence of biological indices of early risk for adult health; (2) assess the role of daily experience in the development of early health risk; (3) examine the existence of ethnic disparities in early health risk; and (4) explore the role of potential protective factors in the development of early health risk. Approximately 540 pairs of adolescents and primary caregivers (180 from each ethnic group) will be assessed when the adolescents are approximately 15-16, 17-18, and 19-20 years of age. Each year, both adolescents and caregivers will participate in interviews that include measures of global social factors such as socioeconomic background and potential protective factors such as social connectedness. Participants will report daily experiences using a nightly diary checklist for 9 consecutive days. Salivary cortisol will be obtained at 4 time points each day for 4 of these days in order to analyze HPA activity, and participants will wear wrist actigraphs for the same 4 days to measure objective sleep behaviors. Blood pressure, BMI, and waist/hip ratio will be assessed, and dried blood spots will be obtained for the assessment of c-reactive-protein (CRP), cholesterol, and high density lipoproteins (HDL). Finally, peripheral blood samples will be provided by a subsample of 120 families for the assessment of plasma interleukin-6 (IL-6), a pro-inflammatory cytokine, and for gene expression analyses of molecular signaling pathways driving inflammatory biology.

Adolescence is a time of heightened vulnerability for risk taking behavior and poor decision making that give rise to substance use and experimentation. Latino adolescents have higher rates of substance use and begin using drugs at an earlier age than other U.S. youth. Familism is a specific type of family connection important to Latino families that implies children?s role in the support and assistance of their family. Recent research suggests that familism is a culturally relevant protective factor against drug use among Latinos, but the mechanisms by which it functions are not well understood. Evidence from developmental neuroscience suggests that risk-taking behavior increases during adolescence partly due to changes in the brain?s neural circuitry. The cognitive control system, which is involved in self-regulation, develops more slowly relative to the socio-emotional system, which is involved in reward evaluation and sensitivity. This neural imbalance may hinder appropriate evaluation of risk and bias youth towards risky decisions. Familism may function by influencing these neural systems and their correlates to real-life risk taking. This research will utilize a multi-method, longitudinal design, including daily diaries and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), to examine neural correlates by which familism may buffer Latino youth from risk taking and drug initiation. No previous studies have examined the role of culture on the neural correlates of risky behavior.

This study advances our understanding of risk taking among Latinos and the culturally relevant protective factors that can reduce risk for drug initiation among this growing population. These findings will enable us to tease apart how the cognitive control and reward systems relate to familism and real-life risk behaviors, which has the potential to inform the design of successful interventions that can efficiently target these systems to help youth make better, less risky decisions. For instance, if lower levels of familism are associated with deficits in cognitive control, interventions can target the improvement of cognitive control processes by training individuals to make more deliberative decisions. If higher levels of familism are associated with reduced reward sensitivity to risk taking, interventions can promote the maintenance of traditional cultural values in addition to the acquisition of other types of reward in youths' lives, such as positive friendships. In addition to informing policy and intervention, findings from this study are useful to guide future research to identify other culturally relevant factors that may protect diverse youth from engaging in drug use and risky behavior.

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): By most accounts, contemporary American teenagers exhibit significant sleep problems. Sleep deficits and inconsistent sleep timing generate public health concerns because they place adolescents at risk for a host of developmental difficulties, including risky behavior and substance use, internalizing problems, obesity and academic underachievement. Efforts to improve teenage sleep must acknowledge that sleep, although a biological imperative is also a culturally and socially embedded practice. With studies suggesting disparities such that ethnic minority teenagers experience greater sleep problems, research that goes beyond simply demonstrating demographic variations and provides a deeper understanding of the role of cultural beliefs and practices in teenage sleep has become essential. Unfortunately, little is known about the processes by which cultural beliefs and practices impact teenage sleep. We propose building the capacity and infrastructure to create a research team and develop a trans-disciplinary toolbox of methods to conduct basic behavioral research on the role of cultural beliefs and practices in teenage sleep. By bringing together researchers with expertise in sleep, neuroscience, adolescent social development, and culture, we will work to (1) further develop and refine a trans-disciplinary conceptual and heuristical model of the impact of cultural beliefs and practices on teenage sleep; (2) develop a new toolbox of methods to study the impact of cultural beliefs and practices on teenage sleep; and (3) test the new methods, culminating in a finalized toolbox of methods to be used in a future, larger study of the impact of cultural beliefs and practices on teenage sleep.

Adolescents' risky decision making and antisocial behaviors have received a great deal of public and scientific attention. Less is known about prosocial behaviors among adolescents, such as sharing and supportiveness. How do changes in the adolescent brain relate to the development of these more positive behaviors? And how does adolescents' tendency to engage in positive behaviors vary depending upon the social context? This project brings together a team of developmental and social psychologists and neuroscientists to study how one particular aspect of prosocial behavior, giving to others, changes across adolescence, and how brain changes relate to the age-related changes in prosocial behavior. One specific goal is to explore whether giving behaviors become more sensitive to the situation (such as the recipient and the cost of giving) across development. Another goal is to understand the involvement of different brain systems (such as those responsible for processing rewards and inhibiting impulsive behaviors) in giving behaviors. A final goal is to understand how other social skills such as perspective-taking and empathy relate to giving and brain developments.

A total of 120 participants at 9, 14, and 19 years of age will participate in an experimental giving task while having their brains scanned in an MRI machine. They also will complete questionnaires and daily checklists that assess social experience, perspective-taking, empathy, and values. Giving to friends and strangers is expected to increase and decrease, respectively, and giving to family will remain stable across the years of adolescence. This differential giving should correlate with greater activation and connectivity among neural networks associated with reward, mentalizing, and cognitive control when giving to friends as compared to family and strangers, and when giving to family as compared to strangers. Differential giving and neural activation according to recipient is expected to be linked with greater valuing and orientation toward peers and family, and individual differences among participants in overall giving and activation will be correlated with social experience, perspective-taking, and empathy. Findings will enrich the field's understanding of the developing adolescent brain for behavior by highlighting the role of neural development in positive, prosocial behavior and the potential impact of social experience in these dynamics.

PROJECT SUMMARY Developmental cognitive and affective neuroscience has been a major force in the renewed focus upon adolescence as a critical period in development with life-long consequences for health and well-being. Scientific advances have highlighted the significance of brain development during this period, with a profound effect on public policy for children and youth, from Supreme Court rulings on culpability and juvenile justice to public health campaigns on smoking, concussion risk, and sexual health. The foundational contributions of research on adolescent brain and behavioral development up to this point offer promise for even broader contributions to the country's public health in the future. In order to best enhance healthy and productive adolescent development, the field will need to expand by developing research and training the next generation of scientists in four primary areas: (1) an integrative approach that incorporates both typical and atypical brain development; (2) the interaction between brain development and the social environment; (3) sophisticated approaches to examining longitudinal change over time; and (4) attention to population diversity according to ethnicity and socioeconomic resources. To our knowledge, however, there is no integrated predoctoral training program on adolescent brain and behavioral development in the U.S. Existing doctoral programs, including those at UCLA, alone cannot systematically and sustainably provide students with the training necessary to advance the future of research in the field. Key limitations include curricular and lab rotation barriers, financial constraints, and the lack of integrated professional socialization in both brain and behavioral development. At UCLA, we possess unique strengths that with the support of an Institutional Research Training Grant from NICHD, can be brought together to create a cutting-edge training program for the next generation of scholars who can advance science in the four areas describe above, and ultimately enhance the health and well-being of adolescents. We propose a predoctoral training program that supports five trainees per year for a two-year period in which students from our existing Psychology and Neuroscience Ph.D. programs enroll in new courses on substantive and methodological issues in adolescent brain and behavioral development, participate in new colloquia and scientific events, receive guidance on professional development and ethical practices, and actively engage in cutting-edge research mentored by top scientists in brain and behavioral development. Trainees will be able to take advantage of UCLA's many institutional resources and commitments to neuroscience and the training of next generation of skilled scientists from diverse backgrounds, including those traditionally underrepresented in the field. Our goal is for the proposed program to help NICHD achieve the scientific vision of ?basic and translational research that combines neuropsychological, behavioral, and social science perspectives, as well as new tools? to improve our understanding of typical and atypical development. .

Project Summary A large body of empirical work has focused on risky behavior and mental disorders during adolescence, but our knowledge of the neurobehavioral developments in prosocial behavior is quite limited. The result is a portrait of adolescent brain development that focuses risk and psychopathology over more positive behavior. This focus is unfortunate because several prosocial behaviors that involve giving to others ? ranging from volunteering to providing instrumental or social assistance ? have been linked to healthy psychological, behavioral, and physical profiles. Giving resources and assistance to others is associated with lower mortality, fewer objective and subjective health problems, and lower depression. The health benefits of giving to others warrant an increased focus on the neurobehavioral developments that underlie this core aspect of prosocial behavior during adolescence, a key point of development that sets the stage for lifelong health and well-being. We aim to advance the field by utilizing a longitudinal design to pursue four specific aims: (1) clarify developmental changes in prosocial behavior during adolescence by longitudinally examining a specific, fundamental prosocial behavior (i.e., giving) and how it increasingly depends upon the situation (i.e., the potential recipient, the cost of giving); (2) examine how neurodevelopment in the reward, mentalizing, and cognitive control neural networks tracks with giving behavior; (3) assess how social relationships, perspective- taking, empathy, and values may relate to giving and neural development; (4) explore potential gender differences in average levels of giving and neural processes. Using a cohort-sequential longitudinal design, a total of 180 participants will be assessed at three times, every two-years, across a five-year period. The total sample will consist of three overlapping age cohorts of 60 participants each and will cover the age span from 9 to 17 yrs. (Cohort 1: 9-13 yrs., Cohort 2: 11-15 yrs., Cohort 3: 13-17 yrs.). At each time point, participants will participate in an established decision-making task optimized for the fMRI scanner in which they will be asked to make real financial contributions to their families, friends, and a stranger under varying conditions of cost to themselves. While making decisions, participants' brains will be scanned for activation and functional connectivity between regions and networks that have been implicated in mentalizing, cognitive control, and reward-related behaviors. Adolescents also will complete questionnaires and daily diary checklists that will assess aspects of social relationships, perspective-taking, empathy, and values thought to predict prosocial behavior.