# Socio-Cultural Stress Profiles, Stress Responses, and Health in Mexican American Adolescents

> **NIH NIH R21** · UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN · 2020 · $201,381

## Abstract

This project is in response to PA-17-042 and examines the longitudinal influence of socio-cultural stressors,
physiological and behavioral stress responses to these stressors, and health outcomes of adolescents in
Mexican immigrant families. Recognizing the challenging social environments in which adolescents in Mexican
immigrant families are embedded, this project creates socio-cultural stress profiles comprised of economic
stress, discrimination and foreigner stress, and language brokering experiences (in which children translate
between English and Spanish for their English-limited parents). Our ongoing research with adolescents in
Mexican immigrant families has identified three socio-cultural stress profiles (moderate, protective, risk), three
stable profiles over time (stable moderate, stable protective, stable risk), and two socio-cultural change profiles
over time (improved, declined). The proposed project builds on a successful study of adolescents in Mexican
immigrant families (PI: Kim, NSF, BCS-0956123 and BCS-651128; NIH, R03HD060045) to examine,
prospectively, the influence of socio-cultural stress profiles in middle school alone, as well as continuity and
change in socio-cultural stress profiles from middle school to high school, on adolescent health (Aim 1).
Specifically, this grant will allow the research team to add measures of physiological health outcomes, namely
inflammation (IL-6, C-reactive protein) and diabetes risk (hemoglobin A1c). We will also test a pathways model,
to determine whether socio-cultural stress profiles are associated with adaptive or maladaptive physiological
and behavioral stress responses that influence health (Aim 2). Further, we propose to test whether the
associations from socio-cultural stress profiles to stress responses to health outcomes are exacerbated or
mitigated through various moderators, including personal (resilience, parent support) and cultural (family
obligation) resources, stress related to legal status, and language brokering places and content (Aim 3).
Physiological stress response will be assessed via cortisol. Acute cortisol will be assessed by measuring
reactivity and recovery to an adaptation of the Trier Social Stress Test, in which adolescents verbally translate
a medical document for their parents. Day-to-day cortisol will also be measured. Substance use and sleep are
self-reported daily, and motionlogger watches worn on the wrist provide an objective assessment of sleep. This
study is very much in line with the 2016-2020 NIH strategic plan of studying normative populations to detect
points for preventive interventions to reduce health disparities. It does so by studying socio-cultural stress
profiles that include language brokering experiences, a common phenomenon in low-income Mexican
immigrant families that has received little attention to date. We examine the complex conditions under which
socio-cultural profiles can function as sources of both risk and protection for adoles...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10023192
- **Project number:** 5R21MD012706-02
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN
- **Principal Investigator:** SU YEONG KIM
- **Activity code:** R21 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $201,381
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2019-09-23 → 2024-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10023192

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10023192, Socio-Cultural Stress Profiles, Stress Responses, and Health in Mexican American Adolescents (5R21MD012706-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10023192. Licensed CC0.

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