Sausage of Science 201: Dr. Molly Fox discusses the importance of Latina grandmothers

Chris and Cristina sit down with Dr. Molly Fox, Associate Professor of Anthropology and of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at UCLA. She studies the evolutionary context of chronic disease and the biosocial relationships between grandmothers, mothers, and children. Her current research projects investigate (1) the biological embedding of immigration and acculturation experiences in Mexican-American women and how this process influences aspects of gestational physiology that are implicated in shaping fetal developmental trajectories, thereby affecting health across generations; (2) psychobiological profiles of postpartum depression risk, etiology, and manifestation; (3) how the human newborn intestinal ecology (microbiome) affects infant cognitive and emotional development, with implications for vulnerability to mental illness; (4) how gestational and lactational (pregnancy and breastfeeding) physiology impose long-term alterations to biophysiology in ways that affect later-life risk of Alzheimer’s and other geriatric disease. Find the work discussed in today’s episode here: Molly Fox, Delaney A. Knorr, Dayoon Kwon, Kyle S. Wiley, Michael H. Parrish. “How prenatal cortisol levels relate to grandmother-mother relationships among a cohort of Latina women.” American Journal of Human Biology. (2023) https://doi.org/10.1002/ajhb.23883 Molly Fox (2022) How demographics and concerns about the Trump administration relate to prenatal mental health among Latina women. Social Science and Medicine. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2022.115171 ------------------------------ Contact Molly: mollyfox@ucla.edu; website: mollyfox.mystrikingly.com/ Twitter: @mollymfox ------------------------------ Contact the Sausage of Science Podcast and Human Biology Association: Facebook: facebook.com/groups/humanbiologyassociation/, Website: humbio.org, Twitter: @HumBioAssoc Chris Lynn, HBA Public Relations Committee Chair, Website: cdlynn.people.ua.edu/, E-mail: cdlynn@ua.edu, Twitter:@Chris_Ly Cristina Gildee, SoS producer: Website: cristinagildee.org, E-mail: cgildee@uw.edu, Twitter:@CristinaGildee