# Life-course social adversity, pesticide exposure, and cognitive outcomes among an ongoing cohort of mid-life Latina women in an under served agricultural region

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO · 2020 · $1,238,686

## Abstract

Latinos are expected to represent 21% of US adults over 65 years by 2060, up from 8% in 2015. Compared to
non-Latino whites, US Latinos have a higher prevalence and earlier onset of Alzheimer’s disease and related
dementias (ADRDs) and face a higher burden of related risk factors (e.g. cardio-metabolic conditions). Life-
course circumstances including social adversity and environmental exposures may shape within-group
variation in ADRDs and related risk factors among US Latinos. Understanding the unique and combined
impacts of social and environmental factors on mid-life cognitive outcomes is critical for informing
early ADRDs prevention efforts; these exposures represent actionable targets for multi-level
interventions. Nevertheless, there is limited research on the impact of social adversity and pesticide exposure
on ADRDs risk, including among mid-life Latinos living in underserved agricultural areas with high pesticide
exposure. In particular, few studies have prospectively evaluated the impacts of social adversity, including
culturally-specific (e.g. migration-related) adversity on ADRDs among Latinos; most studies of pesticides and
ADRDs rely on crude exposure measures (e.g. recall of life-time occupation). We have a unique opportunity to
evaluate social and pesticide exposure in association with ADRDs risk factors among an ongoing cohort of
approximately 550 mid-life Latina women (average 47 years) living in an underserved agricultural region. The
Center for the Health Assessment of Mothers and Children of Salinas (CHAMACOS) study, initiated in 1998 as
an NIEHS/EPA Children’s Center, is a well-established longitudinal birth cohort of low-income, Mexican
American mother-child dyads living in a California agricultural community. Substantial information has been
collected on mothers’ early and mid-life social adversity, mid-life cardio-metabolic health, and pesticide
exposure captured via biomarkers and geographic information system-based residential proximity to pesticide
applications. We aim to add two mid-life cognitive assessments, additional social adversity and pesticide
exposure measures, and brain biomarker data collection (on a subset of 200). Informed by the life-course
perspective and the exposure-stress-disease framework, which posits that social and environmental exposures
may have unique and combined impacts on health, we propose to carry out the following Specific Aims: 1) To
quantify associations between early and mid-life social adversity on cognitive performance among mid-life
Latina women and the extent to which these associations are explained by cardio-metabolic and inflammatory
mechanisms, 2) To estimate associations between agricultural pesticide exposure and cognitive performance
and evaluate whether social adversity and pesticide exposure interact to produce poorer cognitive outcomes
among mid-life Latina women, and 3) To evaluate relationships between life-course social adversity, pesticide
exposure, and brain biomar...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10054668
- **Project number:** 1R01AG069090-01
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO
- **Principal Investigator:** Jacqueline Marie Torres
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $1,238,686
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2020-09-15 → 2025-05-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10054668

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10054668, Life-course social adversity, pesticide exposure, and cognitive outcomes among an ongoing cohort of mid-life Latina women in an under served agricultural region (1R01AG069090-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10054668. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*