Citation

Feurer C, Woody ML, James KM, Kudinova AY, Gibb BE. Dev. Psychobiol. 2019; ePub(ePub): ePub.

Affiliation

Center for Affective Science, Binghamton University (SUNY), Binghamton, New York.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2019, John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1002/dev.21893

PMID

31342522

Abstract

Although there is a robust link between resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), a biological marker of emotion regulation, and risk for psychopathology, the factors that may be associated with aberrant RSA development remain unclear. The goal of the current study was to examine the relation between children's resting levels of RSA and neighborhood crime, a macro-level environmental stressor associated with increased risk for multiple forms of psychopathology in youth. The levels of neighborhood crime were obtained using a geocoded neighborhood crime exposure database, allowing for the objective assessment of the likelihood of crime occurring in the child's community. The results indicated that the relation between neighborhood crime and resting RSA differed for girls and boys such that living in a neighborhood with higher risk of exposure to violent crimes was associated with lower RSA for girls, but not boys. These results suggest that living in a higher crime neighborhood is associated with an objective, biologically-based marker of emotion regulation and highlight how neighborhood crime may be specifically associated with risk for girls.

© 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Language: en

Keywords

crime; residence characteristics; respiratory sinus arrhythmia; sex differences