Testing Ecological Fit and Predictive Performance of Dimensional vs. Cumulative Risk Models of Precarious Housing

• In Event: Assessing cultures and context when data has already been collected: methodological approaches that (re)consider culture and context in child development

Abstract

Background: Housing instability presents a serious public health issue as a correlate of poverty and homelessness, yet the cumulative risk lens largely shaping existing research and policy does not sufficiently address high heterogeneity in child and family outcomes. The emergence of dimensional models of adversity affords new opportunities to explore complex contexts of adversity, such as housing instability and homelessness, which are difficult to meaningfully characterize based on a traditional sum-score approach. Consequently, this study explores ecological and predictive utility of an alternative theoretical framework of dimensional adversity.

Method: To compare performance of the cumulative-risk and the dimensional adversity approaches, 12 precarious housing indicators were used to specify two predictive models, fit to a sample of Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study families living in multigenerational or doubled-up households (N = 2422). Dimensional adversity was modeled via 3 latent factors, each indexed by four indicators: (1) being a victim or a witness of neighborhood crime, perceived neighborhood safety and cohesion indexed threat (2) housing interior and exterior decay, overcrowding, and conditions of the neighborhood block indexed deprivation; (3) residential mobility and instability, household composition, and security of household occupancy indexed unpredictability. Cumulative risk was modeled using all 12 indicators to define the latent risk factor. To test predictive performance of the competing models, latent factors of adversity, measured when children were three years old, were used to predict child cognitive and behavioral outcomes, captured at five and 15 years of age.

Results: Confirmatory Factor Analysis revealed a considerable improvement in fit indices from the single cumulative risk factor to the three interrelated factors of threat, deprivation, and unpredictability. The two models were comparable in the magnitudes and directionality of the robust associations between adversity, measured at age three, and child cognitive ability and aggressive behavior, measured at age five, as well as risk-taking behavior at age 15. At the same time, the multidimensional model showed promise in terms of predictive specificity, evidenced by the emerged links between deprivation and cognitive deficits, threat and aggressive behavior, and unpredictability and risk-taking, pointing to dimension-specific developmental pathways.

Conclusion: These findings indicate that the multidimensional approach to adversity may be a viable alternative to the well-established cumulative risk model, particularly in complex contexts of adversity such as poverty and family homelessness. Collectively, we argue that adopting a multidimensional approach to precarious housing would allow for a more nuanced understanding of conditions that foreshadow family homelessness, barriers to stable housing, and specificities of developmental trajectories, psychopathology, relational health, and family functioning in children and families at risk of or affected by housing instability. Recommendations for future studies and implications of implementing this approach in clinical practice and policymaking will be discussed.

Authors

• Maria Usacheva, University of California - Davis
  Presenting Author

• Susan Goff Timmer, University of California - Davis

• Daniel Ewon Choe, University of California, Davis

• Siwei Liu, University of California, Davis

• Ross A Thompson, University of California - Davis

• Gail S. Goodman, University of California, Davis

• Jay Belsky, University of California, Davis