ArticleSocial science & medicine (1982)2015
Socioeconomic conditions across life related to multiple measures of the endocrine system in older adults: Longitudinal findings from a British birth cohort study.
Article in Social science & medicine (1982), 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Influence of Work on Andropause and Menopause: A Systematic Review.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Pooled it
- Understanding the Secular Decline in Testosterone: Mechanisms, Consequences, and Clinical Perspectives.International journal of molecular sciences · 2026Review
- Biological embodiment of educational attainment and future risk of breast cancer: findings from a French prospective cohort.BMJ open · 2025Article
- Causal Relationship Between Socioeconomic Inequality and Hormone-Related Gynecologic Diseases: A Two-Sample, Two-Step Mendelian Randomization Study.International journal of women's health · 2025Article
- Adolescent endocrine disrupting chemical exposure and academic achievement.Environmental research · 2023Article
- Socio-demographic and psychosocial predictors of salivary cortisol from older male participants in the Speedwell prospective cohort study.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2022Article
- Declining Levels and Bioavailability of IGF-I in Cardiovascular Aging Associate With QT Prolongation-Results From the 1946 British Birth Cohort.Frontiers in cardiovascular medicine · 2022Article
- Testosterone and socioeconomic position: Mendelian randomization in 306,248 men and women in UK Biobank.Science advances · 2021Article
- Curvilinear associations between family income in early childhood and the cortisol awakening response in adolescence.Psychoneuroendocrinology · 2021Article
- Causal Associations Between Educational Attainment and 14 Urological and Reproductive Health Outcomes: A Mendelian Randomization Study.Frontiers in public health · 2021Article
- Circulating insulin-like growth factor I modulates mood and is a biomarker of vulnerability to stress: from mouse to man.Translational psychiatry · 2018Article
- The rate of change in declining steroid hormones: a new parameter of healthy aging in men?Oncotarget · 2016Article
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10 authors.
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Abstract
backgroundLittle is known about how socioeconomic position (SEP) across life impacts on different axes of the endocrine system which are thought to underlie the ageing process and its adverse consequences. We examined how indicators of SEP across life related to multiple markers of the endocrine system in late midlife, and hypothesized that lower SEP across life would be associated with an adverse hormone profile across multiple axes.
methodsData were from a British cohort study of 875 men and 905 women followed since their birth in March 1946 with circulating free testosterone and insulin-like growth factor-I (IGF-I) measured at both 53 and 60-64 years, and evening cortisol at 60-64 years. Indicators of SEP were ascertained prospectively across life-paternal occupational class at 4, highest educational attainment at 26, household occupational class at 53, and household income at 60-64 years. Associations between SEP and hormones were investigated using multiple regression and logistic regression models.
resultsLower SEP was associated with lower free testosterone among men, higher free testosterone among women, and lower IGF-I and higher evening cortisol in both sexes. For example, the mean standardised difference in IGF-I comparing the lowest with the highest educational attainment at 26 years (slope index of inequality) was -0.4 in men (95% CI -0.7 to -0.2) and -0.4 in women (-0.6 to -0.2). Associations with each hormone differed by SEP indicator used and sex, and were particularly pronounced when using a composite adverse hormone score. For example, the odds of having 1 additional adverse hormone concentration in the lowest compared with highest education level were 3.7 (95% CI: 2.1, 6.3) among men, and 1.6 (1.0, 2.7) among women (P (sex interaction) = 0.02). We found no evidence that SEP was related to apparent age-related declines in free testosterone or IGF-I.
conclusionsLower SEP was associated with an adverse hormone profile across multiple endocrine axes. SEP differences in endocrine function may partly underlie inequalities in health and function in later life, and may reflect variations in biological rates of ageing. Further studies are required to assess the likely functional relevance of these associations.
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