Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jul 24, 2025
Collecting Saliva and Measuring Salivary Cortisol and Alpha-amylase in Frail Community Residing Older Adults via Family Caregivers
Published on: December 18, 2013
The implications of socioeconomic factors on salivary bioscience methodological variables in a large pediatric
Hawa Mariko1,2, Kristina A Uban1,2
1Program in Public Health, Susan and Henry Samueli College of Health Sciences, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA, United States.
Insights
Socioeconomic factors impact how saliva samples are collected in children, potentially biasing results. Lower socioeconomic status is linked to increased collection variability, affecting pediatric bioscience research.
Area of Science:
- Pediatric bioscience
- Salivary analysis
- Socioeconomic determinants of health
Background:
- Salivary bioscience is increasingly used in pediatric research due to non-invasive sample collection.
- Understanding how socioeconomic factors influence salivary collection methods is crucial for large multi-site studies.
- Previous research shows socioeconomic factors affect non-salivary analytes, but their impact on salivary collection variables is less understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the relationship between socioeconomic factors and salivary bioscience collection methodological variables.
- To analyze data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study© cohort of children aged 9-10 years.
Main Methods:
- Examined 10,567 participants with saliva samples from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study©.
- Assessed associations between household and neighborhood socioeconomic factors and salivary collection variables (time since waking, time of day, physical activity, caffeine intake).
Main Results:
- Significant associations were found between household socioeconomic factors (poverty, education) and salivary collection variables.
- Lower socioeconomic status correlated with increased potential bias in sample collection (e.g., longer time since waking, later collection times, higher caffeine intake, less physical activity).
- No consistent associations were observed between neighborhood socioeconomic factors and salivary collection variables.
Conclusions:
- Household socioeconomic factors are associated with methodological variables in salivary bioscience collection in children.
- Potential biases in salivary analyte measurements due to socioeconomic disparities must be considered in research.
- Findings are critical for studies on childhood socioeconomic health inequities and require intentional incorporation into analyses.
Introduction:
Salivary bioscience has found increased utilization within pediatric research, given the non-invasive nature of self-collecting saliva for measuring biological markers. With this growth in pediatric utility, more understanding is needed of how social-contextual factors, such as socioeconomic factors or status (SES), influence salivary bioscience in large multi-site studies. Socioeconomic factors have been shown to influence non-salivary analyte levels across childhood and adolescent development. However, less is understood about relationships between these socioeconomic factors and salivary collection methodological variables (e.g., time of saliva collection from waking, time of day of saliva collection, physical activity prior to saliva collection, and caffeine intake prior to saliva collection). Variability in salivary methodological variables between participants may impact the levels of analytes measured in a salivary sample, thus serving as a potential mechanism for non-random systematic biases in analytes.
Methods:
Our objective is to examine relationships between socioeconomic factors and salivary bioscience methodological variables within the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study© cohort of children aged 9-10 years old (n = 10,567 participants with saliva samples).
Results:
We observed significant associations between household socioeconomic factors (poverty status, education) and salivary collection methodological variables (time since waking, time of day of sampling, physical activity, and caffeine intake). Moreover, lower levels of household poverty and education were significantly associated with more sources of potential bias in salivary collection methodological variables (e.g., longer times since waking, collections later in the day, higher odds of caffeine consumption, and lower odds of physical activity). Consistent associations were not observed with neighborhood socioeconomic factors and salivary methodological variables.
Discussion:
Previous literature demonstrates associations between collection methodological variables and measurements of salivary analyte levels, particularly with analytes that are more sensitive to circadian rhythms, pH levels, or rigorous physical activity. Our novel findings suggest that unintended distortions in measured salivary analyte values, potentially resulting from the non-random systematic biases in salivary methodology, need to be intentionally incorporated into analyses and interpretation of results. This is particularly salient for future studies interested in examining underlying mechanisms of childhood socioeconomic health inequities in future analyses.
