Lusting, learning and lasting in school: sexual debut, school performance and dropout among adolescents in primary schools in Karonga district, northern Malawi.

Age at sexual debut is known to have implications for future sexual behaviours and health outcomes, including HIV infection, early pregnancy and maternal mortality, but may also influence educational outcomes. Longitudinal data on schooling and sexual behaviour from a demographic surveillance site in Karonga district, northern Malawi, were analysed for 3153 respondents between the ages of 12 and 25 years to examine the association between sexual debut and primary school dropout, and the role of prior school performance. Time to dropout was modelled using the Fine and Gray survival model to account for the competing event of primary school completion.

Are active children and young people at increased risk of injuries resulting in hospital admission or accident and emergency department attendance? Analysis of linked cohort and electronic hospital records in Wales and Scotland.

Introduction: Children and young people (CYP) are encouraged to increase time spent being physically active, especially in moderate and vigorous intensity pursuits. However, there is limited evidence on the prospective association of activity levels with injuries resulting in use of hospital services. We examined the relationship between objectively-measured physical activity (PA) and subsequent injuries resulting in hospital admissions or accident and emergency department (A&E) attendances, using linked electronic hospital records (EHR) from a nationally representative prospective cohort of CYP in Wales and Scotland.

Exploratory study of the impact of perceived reward on habit formation.

Background: Habits (learned automatic responses to contextual cues) are considered important in sustaining health behaviour change. While habit formation is promoted by repeating behaviour in a stable context, little is known about what other variables may contribute, and whether there are variables which may accelerate the habit formation process. The aim of this study was to explore variables relating to the perceived reward value of behaviour - pleasure, perceived utility, perceived benefits, and intrinsic motivation.

Does early linear growth failure influence later school performance? A cohort study in Karonga district, northern Malawi.

Introduction: Stunting or linear growth retardation in childhood is associated with delayed cognitive development due to related causes (malnutrition, illness, poor stimulation), which leads to poor school outcomes at later ages, although evidence of the association between the timing and persistence of stunting and school outcomes within the sub-Saharan African context is limited.

Methods: Anthropometric data around birth (0-4 months), early (11-16 months) and late childhood (ages 4-8 years) along with school outcomes up until the age of 11 were analysed for a cohort of 1,044 respondents, born between 2002-2004 in Karonga district, northern Malawi. The schooling outcomes were age at school enrolment, grade repetition in Standard 1 and age-for-grade by age 11.

Early school failure predicts teenage pregnancy and marriage: A large population-based cohort study in northern Malawi.

Background: School dropout has been linked to early pregnancy and marriage but less is known about the effect of school performance. We aimed to assess whether school performance influenced age at sexual debut, pregnancy and marriage, and from what age school drop-out and performance were associated with these later life events.

Methods: Data from 2007-2016 from a demographic surveillance site in northern Malawi with annual updating of schooling status and grades, and linked sexual behaviour surveys, were analysed to assess the associations of age-specific school performance (measured as age-for-grade) and status (in or out of school) on subsequent age at sexual debut, pregnancy and marriage.

The influence of school in the development of eating disorders: a record-linkage study.

Background: Clinical impression is that rates of eating disorders vary between schools; we are not aware of any previous research on this topic. We aimed to investigate whether rates of eating disorders in 16-20-year-old girls vary between upper secondary schools, and to test the hypothesis that school characteristics are associated with rates of eating disorders, even after accounting for characteristics of individual students.

Methods: This multilevel longitudinal study made use of record-linkage data from Stockholm County, Sweden.

Life-Course Partnership Status and Biomarkers in Midlife: Evidence From the 1958 British Birth Cohort.

Objectives: We examined the association between trajectories of partnership status over the life course and objectively measured health indicators in midlife.

Methods: We used data from 4 waves (1981, 1991, 2000, and 2002-2004) of the British National Child Development Study (NCDS), a prospective cohort study that includes all people born in Britain during 1 week in March 1958 (n = 18 558).

Results: After controlling for selection attributable to early-life and early-adulthood characteristics, we found that life-course trajectories of partnership status were associated with hemostatic and inflammatory markers, the prevalence of metabolic syndrome and respiratory function in midlife.

Parental mental illness and eating disorders in offspring.

Objective: To investigate which parental mental illnesses are associated with eating disorders in their offspring.

Method: We used data from a record-linkage cohort study of 158,679 children aged 12-24 years at the end of follow-up, resident in Stockholm County from 2001 to 2007, to investigate whether different parental mental illnesses are risk factors for eating disorders in their offspring. The outcome measure was diagnosis of any eating disorder, either from an ICD or DSM-IV code, or inferred from an appointment at a specialist eating disorder clinic.

Lifelong Socio Economic Position and biomarkers of later life health: testing the contribution of competing hypotheses.

The relative contribution of early or later life Socio Economic Position (SEP) to later life health is not fully understood and there are alternative hypotheses about the pathways through which they may influence health. We used data from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing with a formal approach for the identification of mediating factors in order to investigate alternative hypotheses about life course influences on biomarkers of later life health. We found that early life SEP predicts physical health at least 65 years later.

Association of violence with emergence of persecutory delusions in untreated schizophrenia.

Objective: Psychosis is considered an important risk factor for violence, but studies show inconsistent results. The mechanism through which psychotic disorders influence violence also remains uncertain. The authors investigated whether psychosis increased the risk of violent behavior among released prisoners and whether treatment reduced this risk.

Acute alcohol-related dysfunction as a predictor of employment status in a longitudinal study of working-age men in Izhevsk, Russia.

Aims: To investigate longitudinally the effect of alcohol consumption and related acute alcohol-related dysfunction on employment status.

Design, Setting And Participants: A total of 1143 men aged 25-55 years in regular paid employment and resident in the city of Izhevsk, Russia were interviewed between 2003-06 and then re-interviewed (2008-09) and their employment status ascertained.

Measurements: Exposures of interest were baseline alcohol intake (yearly total volume of ethanol consumed and non-beverage alcohols) and alcohol-related dysfunction, measured by a latent variable defined in terms of frequency of alcohol-related dysfunctional behaviours and by one or more episodes of zapoi (a period of continuous drunkenness lasting 2 or more days).

Gang membership, violence, and psychiatric morbidity.

Objective: Gang members engage in many high-risk activities associated with psychiatric morbidity, particularly violence-related ones. The authors investigated associations between gang membership, violent behavior, psychiatric morbidity, and use of mental health services.

Method: The authors conducted a cross-sectional survey of 4,664 men 18-34 years of age in Great Britain using random location sampling.

Activities of daily living associated with acquisition of melioidosis in northeast Thailand: a matched case-control study.

Background: Melioidosis is a serious infectious disease caused by the Category B select agent and environmental saprophyte, Burkholderia pseudomallei. Most cases of naturally acquired infection are assumed to result from skin inoculation after exposure to soil or water. The aim of this study was to provide evidence for inoculation, inhalation and ingestion as routes of infection, and develop preventive guidelines based on this evidence.

Development and evaluation of a semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire for use in urban and rural India.

The objective of this study was to develop and evaluate a semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire (FFQ) for use in urban and rural India. A single FFQ was developed for use in cities and rural areas of four regions of India. To assess validity, the FFQ was administered to 530 factory workers and rural dwellers, and subsequently three 24 hour recalls were administered on different days.

Health differentials in the older population of England: an empirical comparison of the materialist, lifestyle and psychosocial hypotheses.

Background: In developed countries with old age structures most deaths occur at older ages and older people account for the majority of those in poor health, which suggests a particular need to investigate health inequalities in the older population.

Methods: We empirically compared the materialist, psychosocial and lifestyle/behavioural theoretical mechanisms of explanation for socio-economic variation in health using data from two waves of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA), a nationally representative multi-purpose sample of the population aged 50 and over living in England. Three dimensions of health were examined: somatic health, depression and well-being.

Main morbidities recorded in the women's international study of long duration oestrogen after menopause (WISDOM): a randomised controlled trial of hormone replacement therapy in postmenopausal women.

Objective: To assess the long term risks and benefits of hormone replacement therapy (combined hormone therapy versus placebo, and oestrogen alone versus combined hormone therapy).

Design: Multicentre, randomised, placebo controlled, double blind trial.

Setting: General practices in UK (384), Australia (91), and New Zealand (24).

How good is probabilistic record linkage to reconstruct reproductive histories? Results from the Aberdeen Children of the 1950s study.

Background: Probabilistic record linkage is widely used in epidemiology, but studies of its validity are rare. Our aim was to validate its use to identify births to a cohort of women, being drawn from a large cohort of people born in Scotland in the early 1950s.

Methods: The Children of the 1950s cohort includes 5868 females born in Aberdeen 1950-56 who were in primary schools in the city in 1962.

Limits to causal inference based on Mendelian randomization: a comparison with randomized controlled trials.

"Mendelian randomization" refers to the random assortment of genes transferred from parent to offspring at the time of gamete formation. This process has been compared to a randomized controlled trial of genetic variants. This could greatly aid observational epidemiology by potentially allowing an unbiased estimate of the effects of gene products on disease outcomes.