Psychophysical correlates of elevated blood pressure: a study of urban black adolescents

Health through three life stages: a longitudinal study of urban black adolescents

This is a study of life stage coherence and change in perceived health status and morbidity reports over a 15 year interval bounding adolescence. Data were obtained through personal home interviews with a representative sample (N = 426) of urban black youths who were interviewed at three successive life stages: first when they were adolescents ages 12-17, 6-8 years later when they were ages 18-23, and 7-8 years after that when they were ages 26-31. Results showed that health decline was neither continuous nor progressive over the three life stages. Instead, a dramatic increase in morbidity reports occurring between adolescent and post adolescent measurement was succeeded by stabilization in the following 7 year interval. One interpretation of these findings is that they reflect the stressfulness of the adolescent life stage in the urban black youth cohort. The congruence of this interpretation with Mechanic and Angel's theory of differential health synchrony over the life course and also with Antonovsky's theory of sense of coherence in explaining variations in perceived health is discussed. The study, finally, pointed up a serious methodological impediment to attempting comparative life span health studies such as this, namely, the difficulty in arriving at equivalently comprehensive and sensitive health symptom indicators at different life stages.

Project "hypertension alert"

"Hypertension Alert", a 1979-80 blood pressure screening-awareness project of the Yonkers Public Schools, used health aides to work with students and school personnel to determine the blood pressure of 5,399 elementary, middle and high school pupils in 52 public and parochial schools. Using a cutoff of 130/85 mm Hg, 140 students with higher initial readings were followed up by school nurses and nurse teachers. Of these, 36 were referred to their private care providers. "Hypertension Alert" was received warmly in the schools. Many students appeared to acquire "blood pressure consciousness". A carry-over benefit in 1980-81 and 1981-82 has been the greatly increased use of sphygmomanometry in individual school health office programs.

Life events stress, subjective appraisal and somatization in hypertension: a pilot study

The present pilot study was designed as a multivariate test of stress as a factor in hypertension. A model is proposed that includes family history of hypertension, high life stress exposure, the subjective appraisal of being under considerable stress, and the tendency to somatize stress cardiovascularly. Health risk behaviors frequently implicated in hypertensive disease were also measured. A sample of 76 low income black adults were interviewed privately and classified into two groups on the basis of "no elevated blood pressure readings" or "1 + elevated readings." Univariate comparisons generally supported the hypotheses. Multivariate stepwise discriminant analyses also were conducted as a stricter test of the model. Six factors were identified as the major discriminators between the groups: cardiovascular and renal symptoms, family history of high blood pressure, proportion of negative to total life change events, and electrodermal and gastrointestinal somatic reactions. Age and positive life stress experiences were also important discriminators.

Health stability and change: a study of urban black youth

Personal interviews were conducted with a representative sample of 536 urban Black youth at two points in their life cycle: first when they were adolescents, aged 12--17, and six to eight years later when they were young adults, aged 18--23. A total of 47 health problems for males, 48 for females, were inquired about each time. Longitudinal analysis was performed to determine the extent of change, the direction of change, and the health problems most subject to change. The number of health problems increased for both sexes, but the increase was significantly greater among males than females. Male and female morbidity count, thus, became nearly equivalent in young adulthood whereas, in adolescence, young women's had exceeded men's. More detailed age analysis revealed that the greatest increase in male's health problems occurred two years behind that for women: for men, between ages 17 and 18; for women between ages 15 and 16. With but few exceptions, the same health problems which dominated in adolescence continued to be most prevalent in young adulthood. Population prevalence rates, however, understate the considerable degree of shift or turnover in individual cases reporting health problems as well as in general health status as measured by the total number of those problems.

Muscle strength and body composition as determinants of blood pressure in young men

The correlations of blood pressure to various indices of muscularity and fatness were studied in 183 young healthy men (mean age 19.7, SD 2.1 years). Systolic pressure showed significant positive correlations with body fat percentage, isometric strength of trunk extensors, body mass index, lean body mass, strength of leg extensors, heart rate, and the sum of four skinfolds. Diastolic pressure had significant positive correlations with body mass index, lean body mass, body fat percentage, sum of skinfolds, strength of leg extensors, strength of trunk extensors, and age. A stepwise selective multiple regression analysis for systolic pressure resulted in four significantly correlating variables: body fat percentage (p less than 0.001), heart rate (p less than 0.01), lean body mass (p less than 0.05), and strength of trunk extensors per kg body weight (p less than 0.05). For diastolic pressure the analysis resulted in two explaining variables: body mass index (p less than 0.001) and age (p less than 0.05). In a regression equation with 13 variables the strength of trunk flexors was negatively correlated with diastolic pressure. It is concluded that both fatness and muscularity are factors related to blood pressure in young men. The muscularity effect is more clearly associated with trunk and leg extensor strength.