title: Adversity, Adaptive Calibration, and Health: The Case of Disadvantaged Families.
abstract: Epidemiologists and medical researchers often employ an allostatic load model that focuses on environmental and lifestyle factors, together with biological vulnerabilities, to explain the deterioration of human physiological systems and chronic degenerative disease. Although this perspective has informed medicine and public health, it is agnostic toward the functional significance of pathophysiology and health deterioration. Drawing on Life History (LH) theory, the current paper reviews the literature on disadvantaged families to serve as a conceptual model of stress-health relationships in which the allocation of reproductive effort is instantiated in the LH strategies of individuals and reflects the bioenergetic and material resourcetradeoffs. We propose that researchers interested in health disparities reframe chronic degenerative diseases as outcomes resulting from strategic calibration of physiological systems to best adapt, survive, and reproduce in response to demands of specific developmental contexts. These effects of adversity on later-age degenerative disease are mediated, in part, by socioemotional and cognitive mechanisms expressed in different life history strategies.
authors.affiliation: Health Psychology, Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Francisco.
authors.forename: Tomás Cabeza
authors.initials: TC
authors.lastname: de Baca
authors.affiliation: Adolescent Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, College of Medicine, University of Arizona.
authors.forename: Richard A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Wahl
authors.affiliation: Division of Family Studies and Human Development, Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences, University of Arizona.
authors.forename: Melissa A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Barnett
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, School of Mind, Brain, and Behavior, College of Science, University of Arizona.
authors.forename: Aurelio José
authors.initials: AJ
authors.lastname: Figueredo
authors.affiliation: Division of Family Studies and Human Development, Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences, University of Arizona.
authors.forename: Bruce J
authors.initials: BJ
authors.lastname: Ellis
keywords: adversity; chronic degenerative disease; disadvantaged families; evolutionary psychology; harshness; life history theory; stress; unpredictability; unpredictability schema