Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2plfb Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T08:42:11.543Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

ALLOSTATIC LOAD AND SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS IN POLISH ADULT MEN

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 June 2013

ANNA LIPOWICZ ,
ALICJA SZKLARSKA  and
ROBERT M. MALINA
ANNA LIPOWICZ*
Affiliation:
Institute of Anthropology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Wrocław, Poland
ALICJA SZKLARSKA
Affiliation:
Institute of Anthropology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Wrocław, Poland
ROBERT M. MALINA
Affiliation:
Department of Kinesiology and Health Education, University of Texas at Austin, USA Department of Kinesiology, Tarleton State University, Stephenville, Texas, USA
*
1Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Summary

This study considers the relationship between a cumulative index of biological dysregulation (allostatic load) and several dimensions of socioeconomic status (SES) and lifestyle in adult Polish males. The extent to which lifestyle variables can explain SES variation in allostatic load was also evaluated. Participants were 3887 occupationally active men aged 25–60 years living in cities and villages in the Silesia region of Poland. The allostatic load indicator included eleven markers: % fat (adverse nutritional intake), systolic and diastolic blood pressures (cardiovascular activity), FEV1 (lung function), erythrocyte sedimentation rate (inflammatory processes), glucose and total cholesterol (cardiovascular disease risk), total plasma protein (stress-haemoconcentration), bilirubin, creatinine clearance and alkaline phosphatase activity (hepatic and renal functions). A higher level of completed education, being married and residing in an urban area were associated with lower physiological dysregulation. The association between indicators of SES and allostatic load was not eliminated or attenuated when unhealthy lifestyle variables were included in the model. Smoking status and alcohol consumption played minimal roles in explaining the association between SES and allostatic load; physical activity, however, had a generally protective effect on allostatic load.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Biosocial Science , Volume 46 , Issue 2 , March 2014 , pp. 155 - 167
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adler, N. E., Boyce, T., Chesney, M. A., Cohen, S., Folkman, S., Kahn, R. L. & Syme, S. L. (1994) Socioeconomic status and health. The challenge of the gradient. American Psychologist 49, 15–24.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Adler, N. E. & Newman, K. (2002) Socioeconomic disparities in health: pathways and policies. Health Affairs 21, 60–76.Google Scholar
Allsworth, J. E., Weitzen, S. & Boardman, L. A. (2005) Early age at menarche and allostatic load: data from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Annals of Epidemiology 15, 438–444.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Baker, B., Paquette, M., Szalai, J. P., Driver, H., Perger, T., Helmers, K.et al. (2000) The influence of marital adjustment on 3-year left ventricular mass and ambulatory blood pressure in mild hypertension. Archives of Internal Medicine 160, 3453–3458.Google Scholar
Brindley, D. N. & Rolland, Y. (1989) Possible connections between stress, diabetes, obesity, hypertension and altered lipoprotein metabolism that may result in atherosclerosis. Clinical Science 77, 453–461.Google Scholar
Chaouloff, F. (1989) Physical exercise and brain monoamines: a review. Acta Physiologica Scandinavica 137, 1–13.Google Scholar
Cockcroft, D. W. & Gault, M. H. (1976) Prediction of creatinine clearance from serum creatinine. Nephron 16, 31–41.Google Scholar
Crimmins, E. M., Johnston, M., Hayward, M. & Seeman, T. (2003) Age differences in allostatic load: an index of physiological dysregulation. Experimental Gerontology 38, 731–734.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Crook, G. H., Bennett, C. A., Norwood, W. D. & Mahaffey, J. A. (1966) Evaluation of skin-fold measurements and weight chart to measure body fat. Journal of the American Medical Association 198, 157–162.Google Scholar
Dowd, J. B., Simanek, A. M. & Aiello, A. E. (2009) Socio-economic status, cortisol and allostatic load: a review of the literature. International Journal of Epidemiology 38, 1297–1309.Google Scholar
Englert, R. C., Dauser, D., Gilchrist, A., Samociuk, H. A., Singh, R. J., Kesner, J. S.et al. (2008) Marital status and variability in cortisol excretion in postmenopausal women. Biological Psychology 77, 32–38.Google Scholar
Eskandari, F., Martinez, P. E., Torvik, S., Phillips, T. M., Sternberg, E. M., Mistry, S.et al. (2007) Low bone mass in premenopausal women with depression. Archives of Internal Medicine 167, 2329–2336.Google Scholar
Gallo, L. C., Jiménez, J. A., Shivpuri, S., Espinosa de los Monteros, K. & Mills, P. J. (2011) Domains of chronic stress, lifestyle factors, and allostatic load in middle-aged Mexican-American women. Annals of Behavioral Medicine 41, 21–31.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gallo, L. C. & Matthews, A. (1999) Do negative emotions mediate the association between socioeconomic status and health? Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 896, 226–245.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gill, J. M. & Cooper, A. R. (2008) Physical activity and prevention of type 2 diabetes mellitus. Sports Medicine 38, 807–824.Google Scholar
Gorlach, K. (2000) Raport o Rozwoju Społecznym – Polska 2000. Rozwój obszarów wiejskich. OI ONZ, Warsaw. URL: http://www.unic.un.org.pl/nhdr/2000/raport10.pdfGoogle Scholar
Gustafsson, P. E., Janlert, U., Theorell, T., Westerlund, H. & Hammarström, A. (2010) Socioeconomic status over the life course and allostatic load in adulthood: results from the Northern Swedish Cohort. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health 65, 986–992.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hampson, S. E., Goldberg, L. R., Vogt, T. M., Hillier, T. A. & Dubanoski, J. P. (2009) Using physiological dysregulation to assess global health status: associations with self-rated health and health behaviors. Journal of Health Psychology 14, 232–241.Google Scholar
Hawkley, L. C., Lavelle, L. A., Berntson, G. G. & Cacioppo, J. T. (2011) Mediators of the relationship between socioeconomic status and allostatic load in the Chicago Health, Aging, and Social Relations Study (CHASRS). Psychophysiology 48, 1134–1145.Google Scholar
Heatherton, T. F., Kozlowski, L. T., Frecker, R. C., Rickert, W. & Robinson, J. (1989) Measuring the heaviness of smoking: using self-reported time to the first cigarette of the day and number of cigarettes smoked per day. British Journal of Addiction 84, 791–799.Google Scholar
Jarco, P. (2004) Poczucie koherencji jako predyktor aktywności zyciowej i zawodowej. Nauki Humanistyczne Akademii Ekonomicznej (Wrocław) 9.Google Scholar
Kaczmarek, M. & Skrzypczak, M. (2008) Variation in biological status among Polish males and underlying socio-economic factors. Anthropological Review 71, 17–32.Google Scholar
Karlamangla, A. S., Singer, B. H., McEwen, B. S., Rowe, J. W. & Seeman, T. E. (2002) Allostatic load as a predictor of functional decline. MacArthur studies of successful aging. Journal of Clinical Epidemiology 55, 696–710.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kinnunen, M. L., Kaprio, J. & Pulkkinen, L. (2005) Allostatic load of men and women in early middle age. Journal of Individual Differences 26, 20–28.Google Scholar
Kołodziej, H., Lopuszańska, M., Bielicki, T. & Jankowska, E. A. (2007) Social inequality in premature mortality among Polish urban adults during economic transition. American Journal of Human Biology 19, 878–885.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kubzansky, L. D., Kawachi, I. & Sparrow, D. (1999) Socioeconomic status, hostility, and risk factor clustering in the Normative Aging Study: any help from the concept of allostatic load? Annals of Behavioral Medicine 21, 330–338.Google Scholar
Lee, G. R., Seccombe, K. & Shehan, C. L. (1991) Marital status and personal happiness: an analysis of trend data. Journal of Marriage and the Family 53, 839–844.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lundberg, U. (2005) Stress hormones in health and illness: the roles of work and gender. Psychoneuroendocrinology 30, 1017–1021.Google Scholar
Mair, C. A., Cutchin, M. P. & Peek, M. K. (2011) Allostatic load in an environmental riskscape: the role of stressors and gender. Health & Place 17, 978–987.Google Scholar
McEwen, B. S. (1998) Stress, adaptation, and disease. Allostasis and allostatic load. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 840, 33–44.Google Scholar
McEwen, B. S. & Seeman, T. (1999) Protective and damaging effects of mediators of stress. Elaborating and testing the concepts of allostasis and allostatic load. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 896, 30–47.Google Scholar
McEwen, B. S. & Stellar, E. (1993) Stress and the individual. Mechanisms leading to disease. Archives of Internal Medicine 153, 2093–2101.Google Scholar
Robles, T. F. & Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K. (2003) The physiology of marriage: pathways to health. Physiology & Behavior 79, 409–416.Google Scholar
Rognerud, M. A. & Zahl, P. H. (2006) Social inequalities in mortality: changes in the relative importance of income, education and household size over a 27-year period. European Journal of Public Health 16, 62–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Romero, L. M. (2004) Physiological stress in ecology: lessons from biomedical research. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 19, 249–255.Google Scholar
Sapolsky, R. M. & Share, L. J. (1994) Rank related differences in cardiovascular function among wild baboons: role of sensitivity to glucocorticoids. American Journal of Primatology 32, 261–275.Google Scholar
Schnorpfeil, P., Noll, A., Schulze, R., Ehlert, U., Frey, K. & Fischer, J. E. (2003) Allostatic load and work conditions. Social Science & Medicine 57, 647–656.Google Scholar
Seeman, T. E., Crimmins, E., Huang, M. H., Singer, B., Bucur, A., Gruenewald, T.et al. (2004a) Cumulative biological risk and socio-economic differences in mortality: MacArthur studies of successful aging. Social Science & Medicine 58, 1985–1997.Google Scholar
Seeman, T., Glei, D., Goldman, N., Weinstein, M., Singer, B. & Lin, Y. H. (2004b) Social relationships and allostatic load in Taiwanese elderly and near elderly. Social Science & Medicine 59, 2245–2257.Google Scholar
Seeman, T., Merkin, S. S., Crimmins, E., Koretz, B., Charette, S. & Karlamangla, A. (2008) Education, income and ethnic differences in cumulative biological risk profiles in a national sample of US adults: NHANES III (1988–1994). Social Science & Medicine 66, 72–87.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seeman, T. E., Singer, B. H., Rowe, J. W., Horwitz, R. I. & McEwen, B. S. (1997) Price of adaptation – allostatic load and its health consequences. MacArthur studies of successful aging. Archives of Internal Medicine 157, 2259–2268.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seeman, T. E., Singer, B. H., Ryff, C. D., Dienberg Love, G. & Levy-Storms, L. (2002) Social relationships, gender, and allostatic load across two age cohorts. Psychosomatic Medicine 64, 395–406.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Statistical Yearbook of Poland (2011) Statistical Yearbook of Poland. Central Statistical Office, Warsaw. URL: http://www.stat.gov.pl/gus/5840_2144_ENG_HTML.htmGoogle Scholar
Steptoe, A. & Marmot, M. (2002) The role of psychobiological pathways in socio-economic inequalities in cardiovascular disease risk. European Heart Journal 23, 13–25.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Sterling, P. & Eyer, J. (1988) Allostasis: a new paradigm to explain arousal pathology. In Fisher, S. & Reason, J. (eds) Handbook of Life Stress, Cognition, and Health. John Wiley, New York.Google Scholar
Stringhini, S., Dugravot, A., Shipley, M., Goldberg, M., Zins, M., Kivimäki, M.et al. (2011) Health behaviours, socioeconomic status, and mortality: further analyses of the British Whitehall II and the French GAZEL prospective cohorts. PLoS Medicine 8, e1000419.Google Scholar
Turner, R. J. & Marino, F. (1994) Social support and social structure: a descriptive epidemiology. Journal of Health and Social Behavior 35, 193–212.Google Scholar
Warren, J. R., Hoonakker, P., Carayon, P. & Brand, J. (2004) Job characteristics as mediators in SES-health relationships. Social Science & Medicine 59, 1367–1378.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Watson, P. (2006) Stress and social change in Poland. Health & Place 12, 372–382.Google Scholar