title: Educational Attainment and Gestational Weight Gain among U.S. Mothers.
abstract: Education is an important social determinant of many health outcomes, but the relationship between educational attainment and the amount of weight gained over the course of a woman's pregnancy (gestational weight gain [GWG]) has not been established clearly.
  
  
  
  We used data from 1979 through 2010 for women in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (1979) cohort (n = 6,344 pregnancies from 2,769 women). We used generalized estimating equations to estimate the association between educational attainment and GWG adequacy (as defined by 2009 Institute of Medicine guidelines), controlling for diverse social factors from across the life course (e.g., income, wealth, educational aspirations and expectations) and considering effect measure modification by race/ethnicity and prepregnancy overweight status.
  
  
  
  In most cases, women with more education had increased odds of gaining a recommended amount of gestational weight, independent of educational aspirations and educational expectations and relatively robust to sensitivity analyses. This trend manifested itself in a few different ways. Those with less education had higher odds of inadequate GWG than those with more education. Among those who were not overweight before pregnancy, those with less education had higher odds of excessive GWG than college graduates. Among women who were White, those with less than a high school degree had higher odds of excessive GWG than those with more education.
  
  
  
  The relationship between educational attainment and GWG is nuanced and nonlinear.
authors.affiliation: Division of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California. Electronic address: akcohen@berkeley.edu.
authors.forename: Alison K
authors.initials: AK
authors.lastname: Cohen
authors.affiliation: Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, College of Letters and Science, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California.
authors.forename: Chandni
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Kazi
authors.affiliation: Division of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California.
authors.forename: Irene
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Headen
authors.affiliation: Division of General Medical Disciplines, School of Medicine, Stanford University, Stanford, California.
authors.forename: David H
authors.initials: DH
authors.lastname: Rehkopf
authors.affiliation: Department of Kinesiology and Health Education, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas.
authors.forename: C Emily
authors.initials: CE
authors.lastname: Hendrick
authors.affiliation: Division of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California.
authors.forename: Divya
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Patil
authors.affiliation: Division of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California; Division of Community Health and Human Development, School of Public Health, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, California.
authors.forename: Barbara
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Abrams
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D009035:Mothers; D049590:Postpartum Period; D011247:Pregnancy; D064890:Social Determinants of Health; D015430:Weight Gain / Q000502:physiology*