Category: Racial Issues

— More people are drinking than 20 years ago, according to a UT Southwestern Medical Center analysis of national alcohol consumption patterns. Gathered from more than 85,000 respondents, the data suggests that a variety of factors, including social, economic and ethnic influences and pressures, are involved in the increase.

"The reasons for the uptick vary and may involve complex sociodemographic changes in the population, but the findings are clear: More people are consuming alcohol now than in the early 1990s," said Dr. Raul Caetano, dean of the UT Southwestern School of Health Professions and lead author of the paper available online and in the October issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.

The findings, Dr. Caetano said, suggest that continuous monitoring of alcohol consumption levels is needed to understand better the factors that affect consumption. Monitoring also would help to detect as early as possible signs that rates of risky drinking behaviors such as binge drinking or drinking to intoxication may be increasing, said Dr. Caetano, who also is regional dean of the UT School of Public Health's campus in Dallas.

"Changes in the population due to aging, the influx of immigrant groups, and a decline in mean income level because of economic recessions can all impact trends in drinking and problems associated with drinking," he said.

While more Caucasians, Hispanics and African-Americans reported drinking between 1992 and 2002, only Caucasian women consumed more drinks per person. The number of drinks that African-Americans and Hispanics consumed leveled out over the 10-year time period.

In addition to an increase in the number of both male and female drinkers within all three ethnic groups, the researchers also found that among women, Caucasians were more likely than Hispanics or African-Americans to consume five or more drinks a day or drink to intoxication. An increase in drinking five or more drinks a day was also detected among the heavier drinkers in the population, suggesting a potential polarization of drinking practices.

Dr. Caetano said the team also identified several sociodemographic predictors for whether someone was more likely to drink to intoxication. They found that males younger than 60 who did not have a college degree were likely to consume more drinks per month. Being unemployed or unmarried also were identified as risk factors for males getting intoxicated more than once a month, he said.

For the study, the researchers culled data from the 1991-92 National Longitudinal Alcohol Epidemiologic Survey and the 2001-02 National Epidemiologic Study on Alcohol and Related Conditions. The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism conducted both surveys, in which trained interviewers spoke with individuals 18 or older in the respondents' homes. The interviewers used a standardized questionnaire, so both surveys used the same overall methodology. Each study included about 43,000 participants.

Both studies defined drinkers as individuals who had consumed at least 12 drinks that contained at least 0.6 ounces of any kind of alcohol within the past year. Those who hadn't imbibed that much alcohol within the past year or who had never had any kind of alcohol were classified as nondrinkers.

While many uncontrolled variables could skew the results, Dr. Caetano said the overall trend is clear — the proportion of men and women who drink alcohol has risen in all three ethnic groups.

"This suggests to us that a variety of public-health policies such as restrictions on alcohol advertising, regulating high-alcohol-content beverages, increasing taxes on alcohol, as well as treatment and brief interventions may be needed to reduce alcohol-related problems," he said.

Researchers from the University of North Texas Health Science Center in Fort Worth also contributed to the study.

The study was supported by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

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Journal Reference:

1. Raul Caetano, Jonali Baruah, Suhasini Ramisetty-Mikler, Malembe S. Ebama. Sociodemographic Predictors of Pattern and Volume of Alcohol Consumption Across Hispanics, Blacks, and Whites: 10-Year Trend (1992-2002). Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 2010; 34 (10): 1782 DOI: 10.1111/j.1530-0277.2010.01265.x

— It's common knowledge that newlyweds who yell or call each other names have a higher chance of getting divorced. But a new University of Michigan study shows that other conflict patterns also predict divorce.

A particularly toxic pattern is when one spouse deals with conflict constructively, by calmly discussing the situation, listening to their partner's point of view, or trying hard to find out what their partner is feeling, for example — and the other spouse withdraws.

"This pattern seems to have a damaging effect on the longevity of marriage," said U-M researcher Kira Birditt, first author of a study on marital conflict behaviors and implications for divorce published in the current issue (October 2010) of the Journal of Marriage and Family. "Spouses who deal with conflicts constructively may view their partners' habit of withdrawing as a lack of investment in the relationship rather than an attempt to cool down."

Couples in which both spouses used constructive strategies had lower divorce rates, Birditt found.

The data are from the Early Years of Marriage Study, supported by funding from the National Institute of Aging and the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. It is one of the largest and longest research projects to look at patterns of marital conflict, with 373 couples interviewed four times over a 16-year period, starting the first year of their marriages. The study is also one of just a few to include a high enough proportion of Black couples that researchers can assess racial differences in conflict strategies and their effects.

The researchers looked at how both individual behaviors and patterns of behavior between partners affected the likelihood of divorce. They also examined whether behavior changed over time, and whether there were racial or gender differences in behavior patterns and outcomes.

Astonishingly, the researchers found that 29 percent of husband and 21 percent of wives reported having no conflicts at all in the first year of their marriage — 1986. Nonetheless, 46 percent of the couples had divorced by Year 16 of the study — 2002. Interestingly, whether or not couples reported any conflict during the first year of marriage did not affect whether they had divorced by the last year studied.

Overall, husbands reported using more constructive behaviors and fewer destructive behaviors than wives. But over time, wives were less likely to use destructive strategies or withdraw, while husbands' use of these behaviors stayed the same through the years.

"The problems that cause wives to withdraw or use destructive behaviors early in a marriage may be resolved over time," Birditt said. "Or, relationships and the quality of relationships may be more central to women's lives than they are to men. As a result, over the course of marriage, women may be more likely to recognize that withdrawing from conflict or using destructive strategies is neither effective nor beneficial to the overall well-being and stability of their marriages."

Birditt and colleagues found that black American couples were more likely to withdraw during conflicts than were white couples, although black couples were less likely to withdraw from conflict over time.

"We hope this study will lead to additional research on the complex dynamics of conflict between husbands and wives, and the potential explanations for changes versus stability in conflict behaviors over time," Birditt said.

In the first population-based survey to indicate a racial disparity in the psychological abuse of senior citizens, University of Pittsburgh researchers found that African American seniors could be twice as likely to be mistreated than elders of other races. The survey also revealed that African American elders could be up to five times more susceptible to being swindled.

Reporting the survey results in The Gerontologist, the researchers urged that health care and social service workers be especially vigilant for the possible mistreatment of African American seniors.

Lead author Scott Beach, assistant director of Pitt's University Center for Social and Urban Research (UCSUR) and director of the center's Survey Research Program, said the study is important to the developing field of elderly abuse research. Beach worked with coauthors Richard Schulz, director of UCSUR and the center's gerontology program; Nicholas Castle, a professor of health policy and management in Pitt's Graduate School of Public Health; and Jules Rosen, a professor of psychiatry in Pitt's School of Medicine.

The Pitt survey is among only a few that focus on race as a specific factor in elder mistreatment, Beach said. In addition, the population-based survey collected information directly from senior citizens through face-to-face and telephone interviews, the most effective way to document unreported abuse, he explained; typically, elder mistreatment data is gathered from complaints filed with Adult Protective Services. In this way, the Pitt study helps fill a noted gap in elder mistreatment research: The National Research Council, in its 2003 report, Elder Mistreatment, described existing elder abuse research as having "a number of weaknesses," including a lack of clear, consistent definitions and an absence of population-based data.

The team interviewed 903 adults — a statistically large sample — aged 60 and older living in Pennsylvania's Allegheny County about instances of psychological abuse and financial exploitation occurring within the past 6 months and since they had turned 60. The sample contained 210 African Americans, or 23.2 percent of respondents, which is nearly twice the proportion of African Americans living in Allegheny County, Beach said.

Psychological mistreatment included being yelled at or insulted, having personal property destroyed, and receiving threats of injury, stoppage of care, or being sent to a nursing home. Among African Americans, 24.4 percent reported being abused since turning 60 and 16.1 percent reported psychological mistreatment within the past 6 months. Around half as many non-Black seniors reported abuse with 13.2 percent claiming psychological abuse since turning 60 and 7.2 percent saying it happened within the previous half-year. Interestingly, African Americans were usually less upset by aggressive behavior, yet more African Americans reported being "extremely upset" when deliberately insulted or when their belongings were destroyed.

African Americans reported even higher instances of financial exploitation, which was defined as having checks stolen, having money tampered with, and being made to sign documents they did not understand. Only 8.4 percent of non-African American elders reported being cheated since turning 60 and a mere 2.4 percent said it happened within the past 6 months. On the other hand, 23 percent of African Americans claimed that someone meddled with their money since they turned 60 and 12.9 percent said it occurred recently.

Most striking about the team's findings was that the racial disparity in mental abuse or financial exploitation was not explained by additional factors such as education, health, age, or socioeconomic status, Beach said. On average, African Americans in the survey tended to be slightly younger, less educated, and more likely to be single, divorced, or widowed. Nonetheless, non-African Americans of similar means, years, schooling, and marital status were still less likely to report mistreatment or financial deceit, Beach said.

Beach plans to follow up on the survey by including seniors from other parts of the country, interviewing the perpetrators, and developing more standardized definitions of the various types of psychological mistreatment and financial exploitation.

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Journal Reference:

1. S. R. Beach, R. Schulz, N. G. Castle, J. Rosen. Financial Exploitation and Psychological Mistreatment Among Older Adults: Differences Between African Americans and Non-African Americans in a Population-Based Survey. The Gerontologist, 2010; DOI: 10.1093/geront/gnq053

UT Southwestern Medical Center investigators have uncovered new insights on adolescent fighting: what triggers it, and how to stem it.

Varied real-life factors pile on daily to put teens on edge: destructive behaviors like drug abuse, drinking or high-risk sexual encounters; poverty; academic troubles; and even depression. Data analyzed by researchers at UT Southwestern suggests that when teens perceive support from their families and/or schools, it can help mitigate violence.

"Our findings tell us that it's unlikely that traditional cookie-cutter violence-prevention programs will be effective for everyone," said Dr. Rashmi Shetgiri, instructor of pediatrics at UT Southwestern and lead author of a new study, available online and in the September/October issue of Academic Pediatrics.

The analysis of more than 4,000 respondents suggests that violence prevention programs targeted to specific teen populations may be helpful in curbing aggression.

The researchers found that Caucasian and Latino teens who reported either smoking or alcohol consumption were more likely to fight, as were African-Americans living below the poverty threshold.

In addition, the study is the first to suggest that depression may increase the risk of fighting for Latino youth. Dr. Shetgiri said that finding is significant because prior investigations have shown that Latino adolescents have higher rates of depression than other groups.

"Our study didn't examine why depression might lead to increased fighting among Latinos, but it showed that this mental-health disorder was a significant risk factor among both Latino boys and girls," Dr. Shetgiri said.

In reported anti-fighting factors, Latinos who said they felt supported by at least one person at their school were less likely to fight. One of the most important protective factors for Caucasian adolescents was the level of perceived support from their families.

"We didn't find distinctive protective factors for African-American kids, but there were trends toward both family and school support being potentially important," Dr. Shetgiri said.

She added that while the way adolescents perceive support varies, those who were expected to succeed were less likely to fight. "Expecting them to be successful, expecting that they're going to do a good job, could play a very important role in preventing fighting," Dr. Shetgiri said.

Teen violence is a major problem throughout the U.S. Each year, one in three high-school students is involved in fighting, and homicide remains the second-leading cause of death among adolescents and young adults.

Study results were drawn from the adolescent portion of the 2003 California Health Interview Survey. The statewide sample included 4,010 teens (12 to 17 years old) who took part in the telephone survey. The computer-assisted interviews were conducted over a seven-month period by bilingual interviewers in English, Spanish, Vietnamese, Korean, Mandarin and Cantonese and examined health, health-related behaviors and health care access among the state's non-institutionalized population.

Although the study focused on California, Dr. Shetgiri said the findings can be extrapolated nationally.

"The data set reflects the kind of racial/ethnic diversity of a lot of urban populations throughout the country, particularly in terms of the increasing Latino population," she said.

The next step, Dr. Shetgiri said, is to complete focus-group studies with North Texas teens to identify factors that influence fighting from the teens' perspectives as well as which interventions would be most acceptable and feasible.

Dr. Glenn Flores, professor of pediatrics at UT Southwestern, participated in the research. Researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles, and RAND Corp. also contributed to the study.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholars Program supported the study.

It's tough being a teen. Are you in or are you out? Are you hanging with the right crowd? Are you dressing and talking and acting the right way? For adolescents who are ethnic minorities, on top of this quest to "fit in" is the added layer — and the burden — of dealing with discrimination, say UCLA researchers.

In a new study, the researchers found that adolescents from Latin American and Asian backgrounds experienced more discrimination than their peers from European backgrounds and that the discrimination came not only from other adolescents but from adults as well. The level of discrimination also impacted these teens' grade-point averages and their health and was associated with depression, distress and lower levels of self-esteem.

The findings appear in the current online edition of the Journal of Research on Adolescence.

For the study, lead author Virginia W. Huynh, a graduate student in the laboratory of Andrew J. Fuligni, a professor of psychiatry at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA, recruited 601 high school seniors, equally divided between males and females, and asked them to maintain a daily diary for two weeks to record any discriminatory events or comments they experienced. They were also asked to separately record on a four-point scale any physical symptoms, such as headaches, stomachaches or general pain.

Among the teens in the study, nearly 60 percent reported experiencing discrimination from other teens, and 63 percent reported discrimination from adults; 12 percent reported experiencing discrimination on a daily basis. Adolescents from Latin American backgrounds reported more adult discrimination than Asian Americans, who, in turn, reported more adult discrimination than teens from European backgrounds. Latin American and Asian American teens also reported higher levels of discrimination by their peers.

The researchers found that teens who reported higher levels of peer or adult discrimination also reported more aches, pains and other symptoms, as well as a lower overall grade-point average. Thus, discrimination may not only tax adolescents' physical and psychological resources but may also affect their ability to achieve in school, the researchers said.

Although seniors in high school are close to adults in terms of their cognitive capacities and their ability to recognize discrimination when they see or experience it, they are also distinct from adults, said Fuligni, the study's senior author.

"These are the years when social identity is arguably more salient among teenagers who are struggling with defining who they are," he said. "Adding on a 'layer' of discrimination is not an easy thing for them to deal with."

By comparing the amount of discrimination the students experienced with their ratings of their physical well-being and their grades at the conclusion of the semester, the researchers were able to examine the relationship between discrimination and health among the adolescents.

The study furthers the understanding of the normal development of ethnic minority and immigrant adolescents, the researchers say, because it shows that adult and peer discrimination may have implications for adolescents' physical health.

"Discrimination significantly predicted lower GPAs, higher levels of depression, higher levels of distress, lower self-esteem and more physical complaints," Fuligni said. "So the bottom line? Discrimination is harmful."

Funding for the study was provided by a grant from the Russell Sage Foundation. The authors report no conflict of interest.

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Journal Reference:

1. Virginia W. Huynh, Andrew J. Fuligni. Discrimination Hurts: The Academic, Psychological, and Physical Well-Being of Adolescents. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 2010; DOI: 10.1111/j.1532-7795.2010.00670.x

A new study shows that white men and boys are living longer with muscular dystrophy due to technological advances in recent years, but that the lives of African-American men and boys with muscular dystrophy have not been extended at the same rate. The research will be published in the September 14, 2010, issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

Muscular dystrophy is a group of inherited muscle diseases that often lead to early death due to respiratory or heart failure.

"More research is needed to determine the causes of this difference between whites and African-Americans with muscular dystrophy so it can be addressed," said study author Aileen Kenneson, PhD, who conducted the study while with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "Possible contributing factors could be differences in the types of muscular dystrophy, environmental or genetic factors, other health conditions such as high blood pressure, individual social and economic factors or access to and use of treatment options."

The study also found that white women with muscular dystrophy live an average of 12 years longer than African-American women with the disease.

For the study, researchers analyzed death records from 18,315 people whose death was associated with muscular dystrophy in the United States from 1986 through 2005. This period of time was when use of supportive medications and many advances in respiratory and heart care were developed and applied to those with muscular dystrophy.

The average age at death increased by 1.09 years annually for white men, compared to 0.25 for African-American men. Among men who had no weakening of the heart associated with muscular dystrophy, called cardiomyopathy, the average age at death increased by 1.3 years annually for white men, compared to 0.3 years annually for African-American men.

Nicte Mejia, MD, of Massachusetts General Hospital and a member of the American Academy of Neurology, who wrote an editorial accompanying the article, said, "Inequities in the health care delivery system — and the multiple ways in which race constrains access to care — seem the most likely explanation for this racial disparity. Decades of research show that African-American patients have worse access to health care and inferior outcomes than white patients. This study reminds us that we must work to minimize social barriers and provide excellent care to all patients."

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Journal Reference:

1. Aileen Kenneson, Ajay Vatave, and Richard Finkel. Widening gap in age at muscular dystrophy–associated death between blacks and whites, 1986–2005. Neurology, 2010; 75: 982-989 [link]

Americans are united when it comes to many core values, according to a University of Michigan survey. But the nation is deeply divided about certain issues, including gay marriage, immigration, and universal healthcare.

Those are the some of the findings from a series of nationally representative surveys of approximately 500 Americans, conducted by the U-M Institute for Social Research (ISR) at three times over the past year. The surveys, funded by ISR and by the Carnegie Foundation, were conducted as part of the monthly U-M/Thomson Reuters Surveys of Consumers in June and December 2009, and in March 2010. A fourth survey will be conducted in September.

"More than 90 percent of those surveyed agreed that all people deserve equal opportunities in life," says sociologist Wayne Baker, the project's principal investigator. "Just about everyone also agreed that respect for people from different racial and ethnic groups, and for people of different faiths, is also important to them."

In fact, these values are so widely held that they can be said to be American universals , according to Baker, who is a faculty associate at ISR and a professor at the U-M Ross School of Business.

Almost 60 percent of Americans polled in March said they support U.S. policies simply because they are the policies of this country. Just under half agreed that U.S. policies are morally correct.

Nine of ten Americans said that, if they oppose U.S. policies, it's because they want to improve the country. Over three of four Americans said that if they criticize the U.S., they do so out of love of country.

While most Americans said they valued freedom, Baker wanted to learn more about just what "freedom" meant to them, so he asked "To what extent do you agree or disagree with each of these statements:"

"Freedom is being left alone to do what I want;" and

"Freedom is being able to express unpopular ideas without fearing for my safety."

Only about a third of Americans agreed that freedom is being left along to do what they want. But over 90 percent of Americans agreed that freedom meant being able to express unpopular ideas without fearing for their safety. "There was no difference between liberals and conservatives. The vast majority on both sides agreed," Baker said.

Two-thirds of Americans in all three surveys agreed that "Providing healthcare to everyone would be a sign that people in this country value other people's lives." The poor, not surprisingly, were more likely to agree with this statement than the rich. And conservatives and liberals roundly disagreed about this statement. Almost all liberals (95 percent) agreed while fewer than half of conservatives (48 percent) said the same.

Generally, Americans were opposed to same-sex marriage. In all the surveys, fully two-thirds said that "marriage should be defined solely as between one man and one woman." But there was considerable variation in opinion. Older Americans were much more likely to support the traditional definition of marriage than younger Americans were, and so were those with less formal education, conservative Christians, and Americans living in the South.

Attitudes about immigration also revealed some sharp divisions. A large majority (69 percent) of those polled in March said that immigrants — wherever they come from — should adopt American values. But older Americans were much more likely to say this than younger Americans. Formal education mattered as well, with over 80 percent of Americans with a high school education agreeing that immigrants should adopt our values, compared with only 50 percent of those with a graduate education. Eight of ten conservatives agreed that immigrants should adopt American values, but only four in ten liberals said the same.

Two University at Buffalo researchers are challenging the "myth of the well-adjusted Asian American," detailing how members of one of the country's fastest-growing ethnic groups face crucial disadvantages preventing them from receiving quality health care taken for granted by other, more culturally assimilated Americans.

In their paper, "Barriers to Health Care Among Asian Americans," UB School of Social Work professors Wooksoo Kim and Robert H. Keefe write that Asian Americans cannot be carelessly lumped together with such easy stereotypes as "well adjusted" or "successful." In addition to the many Asian Americans who have assimilated well and become accomplished professionals, able to enjoy all the accompanying benefits, millions of Asian Americans still face daunting obstacles that stand in the way of quality health care, the UB researchers say.

Their conclusions are based on analysis of previous research into health care disparities among U.S. racial and ethnic groups, including Asian Americans, and upon U.S. Census data.

Four major barriers — language and culture, health literacy, health insurance and immigrant status — create vast differences between some Asian Americans with access to good health care and those who endure these barriers as best they can, the researchers conclude in their study, published this summer in Social Work in Public Health.

"Previous researchers (who studied selective nationalities or regional groups) may extrapolate from their findings to form a model they believe is representative of all Asian Americans," explain Kim and Keefe. "This limitation not only fails to flush out differences among the Asian-American groups not being studied, but the one group under study is unlikely to be representative of its own ethnic Asian-American population."

All these factors "perpetuate the myth of the well-adjusted Asian American," the researchers find.

"Asian Americans are considered a 'model minority,' which prevents many Asian Americans from getting help when they need it, and this study addresses that issue," Kim explains. "There is a dire need to expand our knowledge regarding better health care services for Asian Americans. I hope health care providers and policy makers become more cognizant of the needs of 12 million Asian Americans in this country."

"The mission of social work research lies in its utility. It has to contribute to the betterment of people's lives," she adds. "In this sense, I am studying Asian Americans in order to improve well-being of all Asian Americans through research.

Before making recommendations for health and social policy reforms, the UB researchers outline the barriers standing in the way of quality health care for an ethnic group that will constitute 8 percent of the American population by 2050:

Language/Culture: Kim and Keefe call language the most "formidable" barrier for Asian Americans looking for quality health care. It is particularly difficult for elderly Asian Americans, they say, who often need it the most and are least likely to be proficient in English.

Health Literacy: Besides having access to good health care, people need to understand the content and context of specific health situations, and use analytic and decision-making skills when they seek health care advice.

Health Insurance: "Despite the public's view of Asian Americans as the financially well-to-do 'model minority,' the poverty rate for Asian Americans as a group is actually higher than that of Caucasians," the researchers point out. As a result, Asian Americans may turn to less-costly but frequently ineffective treatments.

Immigrant Status: Immigrants who decide to undertake the "adventure of immigrating" may be healthier than the average person living in their host country. But the longer they live in their new country, the more the positive effects wear off. And illegal immigrants miss out on many health care benefits, most obviously the denial of jobs offering health insurance.

According to the researchers, attempts to address the issue of uneven health care among Asian Americans need to take these barriers into account.

"The presence of health care experts who are knowledgeable about Asian-American culture and social conditions can help remove, or mitigate, the effects of the barriers to health care for Asian Americans," the researchers write.

Improving access for Asian Americans also improves the chances other under-served groups will benefit from quality health care. In the long run, a country with healthy Asian Americans is a necessary condition for a stronger health-care system in the United States, the researchers say. "Health care for Asian Americans cannot be conceptualized without considering health care for all Americans," Kim says.

— Watching superheroes beat up villains may not be the best image for boys to see if society wants to promote kinder, less stereotypical male behaviors, according to psychologists who spoke Sunday at the 118th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association.

"There is a big difference in the movie superhero of today and the comic book superhero of yesterday," said psychologist Sharon Lamb, PhD, distinguished professor of mental health at University of Massachusetts-Boston. "Today's superhero is too much like an action hero who participates in non-stop violence; he's aggressive, sarcastic and rarely speaks to the virtue of doing good for humanity. When not in superhero costume, these men, like Ironman, exploit women, flaunt bling and convey their manhood with high-powered guns."

The comic book heroes of the past did fight criminals, she said, "but these were heroes boys could look up to and learn from because outside of their costumes, they were real people with real problems and many vulnerabilities," she said.

To understand how the media and marketers package masculinity to boys, Lamb surveyed 674 boys age 4 to 18, walked through malls and talked to sales clerks and came to understand what boys were reading and watching on television and at the movies. She and her co-authors found that marketers take advantage of boys' need to forge their identity in adolescence and sell them a narrow version of masculinity. They can either be a "player" or a "slacker" — the guy who never even tries — to save face.

"In today's media, superheroes and slackers are the only two options boys have," said Lamb. "Boys are told, if you can't be a superhero, you can always be a slacker. Slackers are funny, but slackers are not what boys should strive to be; slackers don't like school and they shirk responsibility. We wonder if the messages boys get about saving face through glorified slacking could be affecting their performance in school."

Teaching boys early on to distance themselves from these images and encouraging them to find the lies in the messages can help, said Lamb. "When you crowd out other types of media messages, you promote stereotypes and limit their options."

Boys seem better adjusted when they resist internalizing "macho" images, according to a researcher who also presented at APA's convention.

Researcher Carlos Santos, PhD, of Arizona State University, examined 426 middle school boys' ability to resist being emotionally stoic, autonomous and physically tough — stereotyped images of masculinity — in their relationships. He also looked at how this would affect their psychological adjustment.

Santos looked at whether boys could resist being tough, emotionally unavailable, and detached from their friends as they moved from sixth to eighth grade; whether ethnicity made a difference; whether their relationships with their families and peer group fostered this resistance; and whether resisting these images affected their psychological health.

Participants were from different racial/ethnic backgrounds: 20 percent were African-American, 9 percent were Puerto Rican, 17 percent were Dominican-American, 21 percent were Chinese-American, 27 percent were European-American and 6 percent were of another race or ethnicity.

Boys from diverse ethnic and racial groups were equally able to resist these masculine stereotypes, going against the common belief that certain ethnic minority boys are more emotionally stunted and hypermasculine, said Santos. Few differences were detected and most tended to dissipate over the course of middle school.

He found that boys were more likely to act tough and detached from their friends as they got older. But boys who remained close to their mothers, siblings and peers did not act as tough and were more emotionally available to their friends compared to those who were not as close. However, closeness to fathers encouraged boys to be more autonomous and detached from friendships.

"If the goal is to encourage boys to experience healthy family relationships as well as healthy friendships, clinicians and interventionists working with families may benefit from having fathers share with their sons on the importance of experiencing multiple and fulfilling relationships in their lives," Santos said. He also found that boys who were depressed had a harder time not acting macho in their friendships.

Interestingly, levels of emotional stoicism tended to remain stable throughout the middle school years and boys who did not adopt these macho behaviors had better psychological health in middle school, he found.

The results show that being able to resist internalizing these macho images — especially aggression and autonomy — declines as boys transition into adolescence and this decline puts their mental health at risk, said Santos. "Helping boys resist these behaviors early on seems to be a critical step toward improving their health and the quality of their social relationships."

It takes a village to keep a pregnant woman at her healthiest, a new University of Michigan study shows.

The study compared African American and European American women and women of lower and higher socioeconomic status to see what effects communalism, or a strong sense of community, had on African American women and women of lower socioeconomic status.

The pregnant African American women and women of lower socioeconomic status had overall higher levels of stress, negative effect and blood pressure than women of higher status based on race or education and income. However, these ethnic and socioeconomic disparities were not observed among women with higher communalism.

The study followed 297 African American and European American women through 32 weeks of pregnancy. Results suggest that a sense of community was more important for a pregnant woman's mental health than ethnicity or socioeconomic status over the lifespan, said Cleopatra Abdou, a social health psychologist who completed the study as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health and Society Scholar at U-M School of Public Health.

The findings of Abdou and her colleagues also suggest that communalism negates the effects of ethnic minority status and lower socioeconomic status on a pregnant woman's blood pressure.

"This paper suggests that it can be very important to distinguish culture from ethnicity and social status, not only as concepts, but also in terms of effects on health and other important life outcomes," said Abdou, who starts this fall as assistant professor at USC in the Davis School of Gerontology.

"I think it's critical to put these results in context. Communalism is associated with better health, especially for women of color and women who have experienced socioeconomic disadvantage at some point in the lifespan," Abdou said. "Nevertheless, we see very clear evidence that higher socioeconomic status is associated with higher communalism, regardless of your ethnic background. It seems that it's just easier to have more of every type of resource, including cultural resources, in this case communalism, when you have more money,"

The paper is scheduled to appear this month in the American Psychological Association's Journal of Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology.