# Educational trajectories & health: when people finish school and how it matters

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, MERCED · 2020 · $434,036

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY (ABSTRACT)
Education is a recognized social factor with important implications for health. Educational attainment is
associated with mortality and morbidity for a variety of conditions and behaviors. We know less about the
mechanisms that connect education to health. In January 2016, NIH released, “Education and Health: New
Frontiers” (PAR 16-080) to delve further into this topic.
We propose a mixed methods approach to address our overall aim – to investigate if and how different education trajectories affect health and how this association may differ by sex, race/ethnicity, and family and school circumstances. Educational trajectories refer to how  people attain their education status, such as high school or college graduate, over time. We will first analyze the 1979 and 1997 waves of data of the National Longitudinal Study of Youth (NLSY).
Then, based upon these findings, we will conduct semi-structured interviews in three diverse populations across the US to explore possible mechanisms for the associations observed quantitatively. Finally, we will go to an additional
secondary dataset, Reasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke (REGARDS) that will allow us to
explore the possible roles of some of the mechanisms identified qualitatively. The Specific Aims for our mixed
methods study are: 1) Using both theory-driven and sequence analysis (data-driven) techniques, determine
what the most common education trajectories are for the NLSY 1979 and 1997 cohorts. Examples include: a)
straight through or “uninterrupted”; b) dropped out of high school; and c) “interrupted high school,” where
students left but returned subsequently to get a high school diploma or a GED. Comparable examples are
possible for a college degree, with the additional example of graduated from high school, went to work or
unemployed, then went to college; 2)Investigate how educational trajectories are associated with body mass
index and obesity, chronic conditions, depression, and mortality. 2a) How do the relationships differ by sex,
race/ethnicity, and family characteristics (e.g. maternal education attainment, adverse childhood experiences
(in the 1979 cohort)); 2b) How do the relationships differ by school characteristics (e.g. dropout rate, economic
composition), school policies, and schooling social milieu (e.g. education level of people in the same
community) ? School characteristics include racial/ethnic composition of the school, dropout rate of the school,
and/or economic composition of students attending the school. Social milieu includes education level of people
in the same community; 3) Based on the results of Aim #2, use intensive semi-structured one-one-one
interviews of qualitative methods of people with different demographic characteristics (i.e. men and women;
White, African American etc) and educational trajectories in different geographic areas to investigate potential
mechanisms linking education trajectories to health, e.g. famil...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 9963084
- **Project number:** 5R01AG056360-04
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, MERCED
- **Principal Investigator:** IRENE H YEN
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $434,036
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-09-30 → 2022-12-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9963084

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 9963084, Educational trajectories & health: when people finish school and how it matters (5R01AG056360-04). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/9963084. Licensed CC0.

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