The Role of Distress Tolerance in Childhood-Poverty Related Adversity and Adolescent Anxiety

Poverty and low economic status have been demonstrated to have deleterious effects on children’s emotional development, particularly internalizing symptoms, and may differ between males and females. Although this relationship has been consistently demonstrated, explanations for its existence have been sparsely explored. The current study examined, distress tolerance, as a mediator underlying the relationship between multiple childhood poverty-related adversity metrics and trait anxiety. Based on the available data from the Chicago School Readiness Project, the current study consisted of a sample of adolescents living in high-poverty, Chicago neighborhoods (N=309) measured between the ages of 3 and 16. Childhood Individual-level indicators of poverty (household poverty, perceived financial hardship, exposure to violence) and structural-level indicators (neighborhood poverty, neighborhood wealth inequality) were measured via self-report or U.S. Census data. Distress tolerance was measured behaviorally at age 15 and adolescent trait anxiety was measured at age 16 via self-report questionnaire. Results of the 5 mediation models and Bias Corrected and Accelerated bootstrapping analyses were not significant and, as such, the moderating effect of gender was not explored. However, the current study demonstrated that distress tolerance has varying relationships across subjective and objective measures of childhood poverty. Specifically, subjective measures of childhood poverty (perceived financial hardship, exposure to violence) were related to increased adolescent trait anxiety. Additionally, objective indicators of poverty (household poverty, neighborhood poverty, neighborhood wealth inequality) were negatively associated with distress tolerance. This new evidence supports targeted intervention at the individual-level to treat persistent anxiety, as well as enacting structural change to increase adolescent distress tolerance, all in an effort to minimize the negative impact of childhood poverty.