The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health): An Underused Resource for Developmental Science

Abstract

The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) represents a data treasure for developmental psychologists working in both adolescent and life-span development. Add Health is a nationally representative sample of more than 20,000 adolescents in grades 7–12 in 1994–1995, who were followed for 25 years into early midlife over five interview waves. The innovative multilevel design collected direct measures of the social contexts of adolescent life and tracked developmental outcomes in health, health behaviors, cognition, achievement, and relationships over time. Biological data appropriate to the developmental stages of the cohort and relevant biosocial processes were integrated into the longitudinal waves of data collection. This review describes Add Health's design and data contents and highlights illustrative Add Health articles that examine developmental processes and outcomes in the areas of mental health, health behavior, cognition, and relationships. We conclude with new opportunities for developmental analyses and suggest future areas of research. Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Developmental Psychology, Volume 4 is December 2022. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.

Midlife diseases of despair and cardiometabolic risk: testing shared origins in adolescent psychopathology

“…Add Health has followed participants across five assessment waves, most recently at ages 33-43 years (response rate = 71.8%). Detailed information about the Add Health study has been previously reported (Harris et al, 2019;Harris & Halpern, 2022).…”

Mass incarceration and cognitive impairment in older adults: Setting a research agenda

“…Indeed, questions on incarceration were included in the Health and Retirement Study in 2012 and 2014 leave-behind questionnaire but have been discontinued; they should be repeated in future surveys to facilitate further research. Second, ongoing longitudinal studies in which respondents are approaching older ages, such as the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health, 41 and National Longitudinal Survey of Youth-1997 42 include details on incarceration and cognitive impairment. However, moving forward, including more detailed information on incarceration history and validated cognitive impairment assessments would significantly improve the potential of future research.…”