Urbanicity, hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis functioning, and behavioral and emotional problems in children: A path analysis
Publication year
2020Number of pages
11 p.
Source
BMC Psychology, 8, (2020), article 12ISSN
Publication type
Article / Letter to editor

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Organization
Cognitive Neuroscience
SW OZ BSI ON
PI Group Memory & Emotion
Journal title
BMC Psychology
Volume
vol. 8
Languages used
English (eng)
Subject
All institutes and research themes of the Radboud University Medical Center; Radboudumc 13: Stress-related disorders DCMN: Donders Center for Medical Neuroscience; Social DevelopmentAbstract
Background: Urbanization is steadily increasing worldwide. Previous research indicated a higher incidence of mental health problems in more urban areas, however, very little is known regarding potential mechanisms underlying this association. We examined whether urbanicity was associated with mental health problems in children directly, and indirectly via hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA)-axis functioning. Methods: Utilizing data from two independent samples of children we examined the effects of current urbanicity (n = 306, ages seven to 12 years) and early childhood urbanicity (n = 141, followed from birth through age 7 years). Children's mothers reported on their mental health problems and their family's socioeconomic status. Salivary cortisol samples were collected during a psychosocial stress procedure to assess HPA axis reactivity to stress, and at home to assess basal HPA axis functioning. Neighborhood-level urbanicity and socioeconomic conditions were extracted from Statistics Netherlands. Path models were estimated using a bootstrapping procedure to detect indirect effects. Results: We found no evidence for a direct effect of urbanicity on mental health problems, nor were there indirect effects of urbanicity through HPA axis functioning. Furthermore, we did not find evidence for an effect of urbanicity on HPA axis functioning or effects of HPA axis functioning on mental health problems. Conclusions: Possibly, the effects of urbanicity on HPA axis functioning and mental health do not manifest until adolescence. An alternative explanation is a buffering effect of high family socioeconomic status as the majority of children were from families with an average or high socioeconomic status. Further studies remain necessary to conclude that urbanicity does not affect children’s mental health via HPA axis functioning.
This item appears in the following Collection(s)
- Academic publications [227437]
- Donders Centre for Cognitive Neuroimaging [3564]
- Electronic publications [107154]
- Faculty of Medical Sciences [86157]
- Faculty of Social Sciences [28417]
- Open Access publications [76296]
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