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Race, Socioeconomic Status, and Cerebellum Cortex Fractional Anisotropy in Pre-Adolescents
Shervin Assari1,2, Shanika Boyce3
1Department of Family Medicine, College of Medicine, Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science, Los Angeles, CA 90059, USA.
Insights
Socioeconomic status indicators like parental education and income impact cerebellum cortex integrity differently across races. These effects are weaker for Black pre-adolescents compared to White pre-adolescents.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Developmental Psychology
- Sociology
Background:
- Cerebellum cortex fractional anisotropy (CFA) measures the integrity of the cerebellum's outer layer.
- Research has not fully explored how race and socioeconomic status (SES) influence CFA.
Purpose of the Study:
- To examine the impact of parental education and household income on CFA in pre-adolescents.
- To investigate racial disparities in the relationship between SES indicators and CFA.
Main Methods:
- Utilized diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging (dMRI) data from 9565 pre-adolescents (9-10 years old) in the ABCD study.
- Analyzed cerebellum cortex fractional anisotropy (CFA) in both hemispheres.
- Employed mixed-effects regression models, controlling for covariates and propensity scores, with race as a moderator.
Main Results:
- Higher parental education and household income correlated with lower CFA in both right and left cerebellum hemispheres.
- Significant interactions revealed that SES indicators had a greater effect on CFA for White pre-adolescents than for Black pre-adolescents.
Conclusions:
- The influence of SES indicators on cerebellum microstructure is less pronounced in Black families compared to White families.
- Findings align with Marginalization-related Diminished Returns (MDRs) theory, suggesting weaker SES effects for minority groups.
Introduction:
Cerebellum cortex fractional anisotropy is a proxy of the integrity of the cerebellum cortex. However, less is known about how it is shaped by race and socioeconomic status (SES) indicators such as parental education and household income.
Purpose:
In a national sample of American pre-adolescents, this study had two aims: to test the effects of two SES indicators, namely parental education and household income, on cerebellum cortex fractional anisotropy, and to explore racial differences in these effects.
Methods:
Using data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study, we analyzed the diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging (dMRI) data of 9565, 9-10-year-old pre-adolescents. The main outcomes were cerebellum cortex fractional anisotropy separately calculated for right and left hemispheres using dMRI. The independent variables were parental education and household income; both treated as categorical variables. Age, sex, ethnicity, and family marital status were the covariates. Race was the moderator. To analyze the data, we used mixed-effects regression models without and with interaction terms. We controlled for propensity score and MRI device.
Results:
High parental education and household income were associated with lower right and left cerebellum cortex fractional anisotropy. In the pooled sample, we found significant interactions between race and parental education and household income, suggesting that the effects of parental education and household income on the right and left cerebellum cortex fractional anisotropy are all significantly larger for White than for Black pre-adolescents.
Conclusions:
The effects of SES indicators, namely parental education and household income, on pre-adolescents' cerebellum cortex microstructure and integrity are weaker in Black than in White families. This finding is in line with the Marginalization-related Diminished Returns (MDRs), defined as weaker effects of SES indicators for Blacks and other racial and minority groups than for Whites.
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