Does Religious Commitment Mediate the Association Between Acculturative Stress and Latinx Young Adults’ Tobacco Use?

Tobacco use is a public health priority in the Latinx community. Identifying factors associated with less tobacco use could help inform community-based prevention efforts. The present study examined whether religious commitment (intrapersonal and interpersonal) mediated the association between acculturative stress and tobacco use among 224 Latinx young adults. Participants completed a battery of measures that included cultural stressors, religious commitment, and tobacco use. Controlling for age and gender, mediation analyses revealed a significant indirect effect in that acculturative stress predicted greater intrapersonal religious commitment, which in turn predicted less tobacco use. There was no direct relationship between acculturative stress and tobacco use. Interpersonal religious commitment was negatively related to tobacco use, but did not mediate the association between acculturative stress and tobacco use. Findings support the need for initiatives to decrease tobacco use among Latinx young adults that include a focus on intrapersonal religious commitment in response to acculturative stress.

Examining the role of racism in the risky alcohol use behaviors of black female college students

OBJECTIVE

This study explores the impact racism has on the drinking behaviors of Black college women. Little is known about Black college women's experience of racism and the impact racism has on their psychological wellbeing and drinking behaviors. The current study fills a gap in our understanding of the role racism plays in the risky drinking behavior of Black college women.

PARTICIPANTS

469 Black college women ages 18-29 were sampled from 8 colleges and universities across the US, in 3 waves from December 2014-August 2017.

RESULTS

Findings suggest that general life stress and perceived racism are significantly associated with alcohol use among Black college women. However, only increased experiences of racism increase Black college women's engagement in risky drinking.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings of this study serve as an entry point for a more nuanced assessment of stressors among Black college women that may inform drinking behaviors in this population.

American African women and smoking: spiritual well-being makes a difference

This study examined relationships among spiritual well-being (SWB), perceived stress, coping, and smoking in African American (AA) women. Significant relationships were found among participants related to SWB, regardless of smoking status. SWB may provide a protective property against stress and the desire to smoke. Results support inclusion of SWB into health and smoking education, support of the AA faith community, and the use of SWB as a component of the healthcare decision-making process.

Stress and African American Women’s Smoking/Drinking to Cope

Associations of urban poverty-related stress with smoking and drinking to cope and the moderating role of kin social support were assessed in African American women. Findings revealed that among a sample of 101 poor African American women residing in economically and socially disadvantaged neighborhoods, depressive symptoms and relationship stress were significantly associated with smoking. Similarly, perceptions of neighborhood crime were marginally associated with alcohol use. Kinship support was hypothesized to buffer women from the deleterious impacts of stress. The results revealed that kin social support moderated the association of poverty-related stress with smoking and drinking. For women with higher levels of kin support, the positive association of neighborhood crime and drinking was less apparent compared with women with low support. Also, the links between relationship stress, depressive symptoms, and smoking were less apparent for women with higher kin support compared with those with lower support. Findings are discussed in terms of the need for additional research on the social networks available to economically disadvantaged African American families and the manner in which networks operate.

Race-related stress and smoking among pregnant African-American women

OBJECTIVES

To examine the association between the psychosocial construct of race-related stress and smoking among pregnant African-American women.

DESIGN

Inferential statistical analyses were performed.

SETTING

Participants were recruited primarily at a medical clinic as well as through word-of-mouth consistent with the snowball sampling technique.

POPULATION

Seventy pregnant self-identified African-American women (32 smokers and 38 non-smokers) 18 years or older participated in the study.

METHODS

Participants completed self-report measures of the Index of Race-Related Stress and an investigator-developed demographic and smoking questionnaire.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES

Smoking status of each participant was established through self-report.

RESULTS

Significant associations were found between the smoking status of pregnant African-American women and the frequency and perceptions of overall race-related stress (p < 0.03 and 0.02, respectively), the frequency and perceptions of both individual and cultural race-related stress (p < 0.01, 0.03, 0.05, and 0.03, respectively). No associations were found between institutional race-related stress and smoking status.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings suggest that integrating race-related stress relieving and coping activities into smoking cessation intervention programs for pregnant African-American women may reduce smoking and subsequent smoking-related reproductive health disparities in the population.

Smoking risk and the likelihood of quitting among African-American female light and heavy smokers

While African-American females are more likely to be light smokers compared to their counterparts of other racially classified social groups (RCSGs), they are more likely to carry a heavier burden of smoking-related morbidity and mortality. Thus, it is critical that African-American female light smokers are targeted to engage in smoking cessation. Research has revealed that African-American women are less likely to have a successful quit attempt following a cessation intervention than females from other RCSGs. It has been postulated that the low smoking cessation rates among African-American female light smokers may be due to the lack of appropriate psychosocioculturally tailored cessation interventions that address issues of stress and coping that explain why they smoke and continue to smoke that may differ from their heavy smoker counterparts. The purpose of this study was to ascertain whether African-American female light smokers differed from their heavy smoker counterparts on psychosociocultural stress and coping factors. Findings revealed no differences in the sociodemographic variables of age, income, education and BMI; in the psychosociocultural measures of acculturative stress, race-related stress and coping; or in the smoking characteristics of menthol smoking status, cotinine level and CYP2A6 metabolic functioning between light and heavy smokers. However, the study found that African-American female light smokers take longer to smoke their first cigarette of the day, have a lower smoking risk, are more likely to quit, and exhibit lower carbon monoxide levels than African-American female heavy smokers. The current study suggests that other than the obvious factors of greater likelihood of quitting, lower smoking risk, longer latency to smoke and lower carbon monoxide levels, specific smoking cessation programs may not need to be differentially psychosocio-culturally tailored for African-American female light smokers compared to their heavy-smoking counterparts.