American Journal of Public Health
Volume 104, Issue 11, 2014, Pages 2138-2146

Neighborhood Ethnic composition, spatial assimilation, and change in body mass index over time among hispanic and Chinese immigrants: Multi-ethnic study of atherosclerosis (Article)

Lê-Scherban F.* , Albrecht S.S. , Osypuk T.L. , Sánchez B.N. , Diez Roux A.V.
  • a Department of Epidemiology, University of Michigan School of Public Health, Ann Arbor, MI, United States
  • b Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, United States
  • c Division of Epidemiology and Community Health, University of Minnesota School of Public Health, Minneapolis, MN, United States
  • d Department of Biostatistics, University of Michigan School of Public Health, United States
  • e Department of Epidemiology, University of Michigan School of Public Health, Ann Arbor, MI, United States

Abstract

Objectives. We investigated relations between changes in neighborhood ethnic composition and changes in body mass index (BMI) and waist circumference among Chinese and Hispanic immigrants in the United States. Methods. We used Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis data over a median 9-year follow-up (2000-2002 to 2010-2012) among Chinese (n = 642) and Hispanic (n = 784) immigrants aged 45 to 84 years at baseline. We incorporated information about residential moves and used econometric fixed-effects models to control for confounding by time-invariant characteristics. We characterized neighborhood racial/ethnic composition with census tract-level percentage Asian for Chinese participants and percentage Hispanic for Hispanic participants (neighborhood coethnic concentration). Results. In covariate-adjusted longitudinal fixed-effects models, results suggested associations between decreasing neighborhood coethnic concentration and increasing weight, although results were imprecise: within-person BMI increases associated with an interquartile range decrease in coethnic concentration were 0.15 kilograms per meters squared (95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.00, 0.30) among Chinese and 0.17 kilograms per meters squared (95% CI = -0.17, 0.51) among Hispanic participants. Results did not differ between those who did and did not move during follow-up. Conclusions. Residential neighborhoods may help shape chronic disease risk among immigrants. © 2014, American Public Health Association Inc. All rights reserved.

Author Keywords

[No Keywords available]

Index Keywords

multicenter study Caucasian clinical trial demography Waist Circumference human epidemiology middle aged statistics and numerical data Aged African American Hispanic Americans Residence Characteristics United States Humans migrant Hispanic Asian Americans male Emigrants and Immigrants Asian American Aged, 80 and over female very elderly European Continental Ancestry Group body mass Body Mass Index African Americans weight gain
Link
https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-84907820036&doi=10.2105%2fAJPH.2014.302154&partnerID=40&md5=b0882e86d9db1d7585aedf72fc425bdd
DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.2014.302154
ISSN: 00900036
Cited by: 14
Original Language: English