Greater levels of acculturation and increased
time living in the US have been consistently linked with worsening mental health among Latina/os, yet the mechanisms through which these processes operate have yet to be understood. Experiences and environments related to immigrant or minority status, such as discrimination or family context, are important and may contribute to this phenomenon. One reason for the mixed findings in the field of acculturation research may be due to treating Latina/os as a homogeneous group. This presentation will use a latent variable framework to investigate different subgroups of Latina/os based on their acculturative experiences in the US and how these groups differ in terms of common mental and behavioral disorder prevalence. 

Dr. Kimberly Roth is a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis. Dr. Roth’s research focuses on the epidemiology of mental disorders in Latinx populations, both in the US and globally. She received a Masters of Health Science (MHS) from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (JHSPH) in 2009 where her thesis explored the association between suicidality, depression and antisocial behavior among adults in Mexico. She earned her PhD from the Department of Mental Health at JHSPH in 2018. Her dissertation used a latent variable framework to explore the relationship between psychiatric disorders and acculturative experiences among US-residing Latinxs. Dr. Roth has participated in the implementation and analysis of several longitudinal cohort studies involving HIV research, the epidemiology of mental disorders, and a randomized field trial of the Good Behavior Game in urban elementary school students.