Project Details
Projekt
Intergenerational transmission of health disparities among Turkish-origin residents in Germany: role of maternal stress and stress biology during pregnancy.
Subject Area
Personality Psychology, Clinical and Medical Psychology, Methodology
Term
from 2015 to 2021
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 269444679
The importance of addressing the issue of health disparities is well established. Based on the consideration that many of the population health disparities between immigrants of Turkish origin and native Germans that are perpetuated across generations are manifest from the earliest stages of the lifespan onwards, we posit that the origins of these health disparities may trace back, in part, to the effects of maternal social disadvantage on her child's development during the critical period of intrauterine life. We advance the hypothesis that context- and time-inappropriate levels of social disadvantage-related stress biology exposures (maternal-placental-fetal (MPF) endocrine and immune/ inflammatory state) during fetal life may program the structural and functional integrity of cells, tissues and organ systems in a manner that impacts subsequent health and disease risk-related outcomes. As an essential first step towards addressing this hypothesis, we seek to elucidate the effects of maternal migration status and socioeconomic status (the principal proxy measures of social disadvantage) on stress-related MPF biological processes across gestation. We propose to conduct a prospective, longitudinal study in a cohort of Turkish-origin and German-origin pregnant women recruited during early gestation. A unique strength of our proposal is the availability of a cohort of 1500 mother-child dyads of diverse background in terms of their migration status and SES (BaBi-study, BMBF grant 01ER1202, Jacob Spallek, PI) that is currently being recruited. This cohort will be characterized over the course of pregnancy and postnatally with respect to individual and contextual factors and child health outcomes at 0-4 years. The current proposal requests funds to add measures during pregnancy of endocrine (CRH, cortisol) and immune (CRP, IL-6) stress biology at two time points in the second and third trimesters of gestation) in a subgroup of N=300 women (N=150 immigrants of Turkish background, and N=150 native German women). We have assembled an interdisciplinary team of established investigators with complementary expertise. Our study will generate new information about the health of Turkish-origin residents in Germany and shed light on the causes and mechanisms of intergenerational cycles of vulnerability.
DFG Programme
Research Grants
International Connection
USA
Cooperation Partners
Professor Dr. Oliver Razum; Professor Dr. Pathik D. Wadhwa, Ph.D.
