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According to Leahey, LaRose, Fava, and Wing (2011), nearly half of all young adults are considered overweight or obese. Further, on average, young adults gain between 1 and 2 pounds annually, making them more susceptible to yearly weight gain than any other age group. College students in particular may be vulnerable to continual weight gain over the course of their 4-year education; a review by Hellmich (2008) revealed that many students gain between 6 and 9 pounds during their freshman year alone. Despite the increased risk for weight gain during the young adult years, Leahey and colleagues report that this age group is underrepresented in behavioral weight management programs. Therefore, research must determine the psychosocial factors that are likely to influence young people in their efforts to manage their weight and health. Social support may be such a mechanism; a study by Strong and colleagues (2008) demonstrated that social support was influential in college students' decisions to participate in exercise and avoid sedentary behaviors. However, a scale measuring social support has not been developed for use with college students in regard to general health behaviors. In the current study, a 37-item self-report instrument was developed. This social support measure was administered to 466 Virginia Tech undergraduates, along with a battery of questionnaires assessing other health habits. Results revealed three possible types of social support, and indicated that social support — while unrelated to body mass index — is related to healthy eating behaviors, vigorous exercise, and health choices of significant others. / Ph. D.

Type 2 diabetes affects more than one-quarter of older adults in the United States. Many older adults manage type 2 diabetes (T2D) in the context of marriage, although few studies have acknowledged the effect the illness has on marital quality. The current study examined how the presence of T2D in later life relates to marital quality, and how positive health behaviors--diet, physical activity, and sleep--can moderate the relationship between T2D and marital quality. Data from the 1,200 married older adults in the Life and Family Legacies study were used to estimate moderation models using structural equation modeling in Mplus. Results indicated that T2D is associated with declines in marital quality. In addition, lower glycemic diets moderate the association such that healthy diets (higher intake of low glycemic indexed foods) buffer the impact on T2D on marital quality. These findings suggest T2D effects social relationships, and that positive health behaviors, especially healthy diets, can help buffer the negative association between T2D and marital quality. These results have implication for health care providers who can view patients' diabetes management in the context of their health behaviors and social relationships to best provide resources for management.

The present study examined the relationships of depression, social support, and socio-demographic factors on health behaviors of mothers with preterm infants hospitalized in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). In addition, the study also assessed the moderation effect of social support on the relationship between depression and health behaviors. Eighty-nine mothers with hospitalized infants in the central Richmond area participated in the study. Analyses found that mother’s education level and her marital status to be significantly associated with her health behaviors. Mothers with a higher level of education and those who were married, were less likely to smoke and more likely to incorporate high fiber foods in their diet. In addition, the more support a mother perceived from family and friends, the less likely she was to smoke cigarettes. Neither depression nor social support from the father was significantly related to health behaviors. This study did not find social support to be a moderator between depression and health behaviors. However, the study found direct effects of socio-demographic factors and certain types of support on health behaviors. Assessing a mother’s personal and interpersonal factors will inform clinicians of possible areas of interventions for mothers during the postpartum period.

Background: Health policies that seek to improve pregnancy outcomes focus on increasing the availability and access to prenatal care (PNC) services based on studies that support an association between insufficient PNC and adverse birth outcomes. These studies employ PNC utilization indices that measure the adequacy of PNC use, but these indices fail to account for the content or specific components of PNC. Objectives: The purpose of this study was to utilize PRAMS and birth certificate data to evaluate the content and quality of PNC in Virginia, and its impact on preterm birth and maternal postpartum health behaviors. Methods: Data was from the 2007 Virginia Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring System (PRAMS). This population-based data is representative of all Virginia women who have had a live birth recently and included 1,236 female participants. Results: Inadequate PNC was associated with nearly a three-fold increase in risk of low birth weight (OR = 2.8, 95% CI = 1.5, 5.2), but not preterm birth. Women with adequate plus PNC were more likely to deliver infants who were preterm (OR = 10.2, 95% CI = 4.3, 24.4) and low birth weight (OR = 6.3, 95% CI = 4.2, 9.4). After adjusting for method of payment, income, and reported problems during pregnancy, women with lower income and no private insurance were more likely to have inadequate PNC (OR = 1.4, 95% CI = 0.5, 4.1) and (OR = 8.8, 95% CI = 1.3, 59.8), respectively. Provider discussions were not different based on adequacy of PNC. In addition, among women who received adequate PNC, those whose providers discussed postpartum birth control use were 4.5 times more likely to use birth control after delivery compared to women who did not receive education (95% CI=1.7, 11.8). Conclusion: The lack of strong associations between adequacy of PNC and birth outcomes indicate that there are other factors (intergenerational, stress, cultural) that may play a more prominent role in predicting maternal and infant health.

In order to better understand variations of health behaviors between US-born and foreign-born elderly Asian Americans (65+) in the United States, the research aims to explore relationships among health outcomes, healthcare utilization, and sociodemographic characteristics. Data from the National Health Interview Survey 1998-2012 is used to construct structural equation models for the US born group and for the foreign born group. The results found that there is a reciprocal relationship between health outcomes and healthcare utilization in both groups. Use of healthcare services can positively affect health outcomes, while better health outcomes reduce the need for healthcare utilization. In addition, some sociodemographic characteristics, such as age, sex, and marital status have a direct effect on health outcomes, but some others, such as education, family size and combined family income, have an indirect effect on health outcomes via healthcare utilization. The region of residency has both direct and indirect effects on health outcomes. Regarding the effects of predictors on health outcomes, US-born elderly Asians usually receive more health advantages from using institutional health services than foreign-born elderly Asians. Practitioners, social gerontologists, and policy makers should be cautious about assuming that there is a positive impact of increased healthcare utilization on health outcomes in elderly Asian Americans.