Social and Familial Relationships and Health

The health and mental health of individuals has been shown to influence, and be influenced by, the health and mental health of their family members. BioPop seeks to better understand the ways in which family members’ health is linked, and the biological mechanisms underlying the observed relationship between health within a family.

Interactions between Childhood Illness and the Family
Funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development

Dr. Whitney Witt is the Principal Investigator of a five-year career development grant from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) to examine the impact of childhood illness on the family. As part of this work she will assess and compare the level of psychological stress, both self-reported and biologically measured, between parents of children with cancer and parents of children without cancer. Moreover, this study will examine the feasibility, performance, and comparability of stress biomarkers and perceived psychological stress among parental caregivers and how such measures are related to child health outcomes. Little is known about the long-term socio-economic, family functioning, and health impact on children with illness in families across the US. The results from this research may lead to a new understanding of the longitudinal perceived and biological impact of childhood chronic illness on the family and help improve the health and well being of children with chronic illness and their families.

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Stress in Mothers in the Newborn Lung Project Statewide Cohort Study

Little is known about the impact of very low birth weight (VLBW) infants and children on families, particularly mothers. The primary aim of this research is to examine symptoms of stress in mothers of surviving VLBW children and to compare them with mothers of normal birth weight (NBW) children.

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