Chronic stress and adiposity in youth-parent dyads: An actor-partner interdependence analysis

Obesity is one of the most prominent health issues in modern society. Although previous research has identified chronic psychological stress as a risk factor for obesity, much of this research only examined how an individual's own stress affects their adiposity. The current study utilized an actor-partner interdependence model to examine the unique associations of youths' and parents' chronic stress with both their own and each other's adiposity.

Five hundred sixty-nine dyads of youths (48.7% females, 49.9% Whites, M_age = 13.70 years) and one of their parents (82.6% females, 58.2% Whites, M_age = 45.38 years) participated in a cross-sectional lab study, where both youths and parents completed interviews and anthropometric measurements. Trained interviewers conducted the UCLA Life Stress Interview to assess chronic psychological stress of youths and parents, respectively. Youth and parent adiposity was measured using three indicators, including body mass index, waist circumference, and body fat percentage.

The actor-partner interdependence model showed that when both youths' and parents' chronic stress were included simultaneously in the model, youths' chronic stress was uniquely associated with both their own and their parents' adiposity, and parents' chronic stress was also uniquely associated with youths' adiposity.

Chronic psychological stress of youths and parents is uniquely associated with each other's adiposity, over and above their own stress. Thus, the psychosocial experiences of close others can be linked to both youth and adult obesity. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).