Life Stress Pathways and Resilience to Substance Misuse in Black and White Youth

Exposure to life stressors across development is known to increase the likelihood of adolescent substance misuse, but the few available comparisons of Black and White youth have revealed a paradox. Whereas Black youth are more likely than White youth to experience stressors in the form of socioeconomic disadvantage and traumatic events, studies show they have lower rates of nearly all types of substance misuse. This paradox could have health implications; the adverse consequences of substance misuse, once initiated, are more severe for Blacks than Whites. However, significant gaps in knowledge exist and will be addressed in the proposed study. Little is known about how the different types, timing, and trajectories of stress exposures may differentially predict substance misuse for Black and White youth (Aim 1), and potentially through different mediating mechanisms (Aim 2), including parenting, neurocognitive functioning, and psychopathology. Also, it is important to understand the resilience-promoting protective factors that may be stronger buffers against stressor-related risk for substance misuse for Blacks than Whites (Aim 3). This application proposes to extend the ongoing CANDLE (Conditions Affecting Neurocognitive Development and Learning in Early Childhood) study, a longitudinal cohort study involving 1,136 women recruited from 2006-2011 in Shelby County/Memphis, TN during their second trimesters of pregnancy. The sample is 60% Black and 34% White. Extensive multi-method data have been collected during the prenatal period and through childhood up to age 12 years. The proposed research will collect new data in adolescence at ages 14, 15, and 16 years to examine life stressors in relation to the onset and progression of substance misuse for Black compared to White youth, with tests of differences as well as similarities in mediating pathways and resilience factors. A local advisory board of community members and advocates has already been formed and will help guide this study. Based on stress-coping theories of addiction, the central hypotheses are that different patterns of stress exposures will predict substance misuse for both Black and White youth. Based on resiliency theory, Black youth also are expected to display unique patterns of resilience against substance misuse.