Social relationships and cardiometabolic risk in low-income mothers following birth

The social environment influences women's cardiometabolic health across the lifespan, but little is known about women's cardiometabolic health in the time surrounding birth. The goals of the present study were to use a person-centered approach to characterize social relationship profiles of low-to-middle income Black, Latina, and White women and test associations with postpartum cardiometabolic risk.

Data were collected by the Community Child Health Network (CCHN), a community-based participatory research network (Nanalytic sample = 1,328). Home interviews at 1, 6, and 12 months after birth assessed the quality and functioning of social relationships at multiple levels including intimate partner, family, social network, and neighborhood. Latent profile analysis (LPA) was used to identify profiles of women who shared similar social characteristics. Standardized cardiometabolic risk and clinical cutoff risk indices were computed from measures of blood pressure, waist circumference, glycosylated hemoglobin, and HDL cholesterol collected at 6- and 12-month post birth. Logistic regression was used to determine associations of profile membership with sociodemographic characteristics and cardiometabolic risk.

LPA analyses revealed four profiles: (a) strong relationships, (b) strong partner/weak network, (c) weak partner/strong network, and (d) weak relationships. Women with a higher standardized cardiometabolic risk score were 1.72 and 1.81 times more likely to be in the weak partner/strong network profile than the strong relationships or strong partner/weak network profiles. Cardiometabolic clinical cutoff scores were unrelated to profile membership.

These findings have implications for the identification of women for intervention before, during, or after pregnancy to reduce cardiometabolic risk. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).