Lauren Bishop
About me
Lauren studies the complex association between linked lives and morbidity and mortality attributable to use of psychoactive substances. Centered in life course theories, she uses longitudinal cohort data and advanced statistical methods to estimate associations between different familial linkages and substance use-attributable health outcomes between young adulthood and retirement age. Ultimately, her thesis aims to examine the social context in which these linkages occur, and their implications for the persistence of health inequalities.
Lauren's doctoral research contributes to the ‘Reproduction of inequality through linked lives’ (RELINK) project at the Centre for Health Equity Studies (CHESS, Stockholm University/Karolinska Institute) within the Department of Public Health Sciences. She is also affiliated with the International Max Planck Research School for Population, Health and Data Science (IMPRS-PHDS), and was a guest researcher in the Population Health Lab at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany from February to May 2022.
Prior to her doctoral studies, Lauren was a research analyst in the Department of Health Sciences Research at the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago. While at NORC, Lauren contributed to multiple federal projects focused on reducing health inequalities, improving care, and researching the social, behavioral, and environmental impacts on health among vulnerable populations.
Teaching
Lauren gave guest lectures in the courses "An Introduction to Public Health Sciences" and "Psychological Perspectives on Health", was a course assistant in "Quantitative Analytical Methods", and lead seminars as part of the In-Practice Seminar Series, all within the master's program "Population health: Societal and individual perspectives". She has also supervised two students at the master's level.
Research
Lauren's research currently contributes to the following projects:
Reproduction of inequality through linked lives (RELINK)
She previously collaborated on the (completed) project entitled Dandelion children: protective factors among children with alcohol misusing parents.
Research projects
Publications
A selection from Stockholm University publication database
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Friends' childhood adversity and long-term implications for substance misuse
2021. Lauren Bishop, Ylva B. Almquist. Addiction 116 (3), 632-640
ArticleRead more about Friends' childhood adversity and long-term implications for substance misuseBackground and aims Although an individual's childhood adversity is predictive of later substance misuse, the effect of adversity within an individual's friendship network has not been established. The current study aims to estimate the strength of the association between exposure to childhood adversity among individuals' friends at the onset of adolescence, relative to individuals' own exposure to childhood adversity, and hospitalization for substance misuse between young adulthood and retirement. Design Prospective cohort study. Setting Stockholm, Sweden. Participants Individuals born in 1953, living in Stockholm in 1963, and who nominated three best friends in the 6th grade school class (n = 7180; females = 3709, males = 3471), followed to 2016. Measurements The outcome was hospitalization with a main or secondary diagnosis attributed to substance misuse, reflected in Swedish inpatient records (ages 19-63 years). Five indicators of childhood adversity (ages 0-12 years) were operationalized into composite measures for individuals and their friends, respectively. Friendships were identified using sociometric data collected in the school class setting (age 13 years). Findings Individuals' own childhood adversity does not predict childhood adversity among friends (P > 0.05). Childhood adversity among friends is independently associated with an increased risk of an individual's later substance misuse [hazard ratio (HR) = 1.17, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.09-1.24], independently of an individual's own childhood adversity (HR = 1.47, 95% CI = 1.34-1.61). However, childhood adversity among friends does not moderate the association between individuals' own childhood adversity and later substance misuse. Conclusions Within a birth cohort of individuals born in 1950s Stockholm, Sweden, childhood adversity among an individual's friends appears to predict the individual's substance misuse in later life independently of an individual's own exposure to childhood adversity.
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Intergenerational transmission of alcohol misuse
2020. Ylva B. Almquist (et al.). Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health 74 (7), 598-604
ArticleRead more about Intergenerational transmission of alcohol misuseBackground Children whose parents misuse alcohol have increased risks of own alcohol misuse in adulthood. Though most attain lower school marks, some still perform well in school, which could be an indicator of resilience with protective potential against negative health outcomes. Accordingly, the aim of this study was to examine the processes of mediation and interaction by school performance regarding the intergenerational transmission of alcohol misuse.
Methods Data were drawn from a prospective Swedish cohort study of children born in 1953 (n=14 608). Associations between parental alcohol misuse (ages 0–19) and participants' own alcohol misuse in adulthood (ages 20–63) were examined by means of Cox regression analysis. Four-way decomposition was used to explore mediation and interaction by school performance in grade 6 (age 13), grade 9 (age 16) and grade 12 (age 19).
Results Mediation and/or interaction by school performance accounted for a substantial proportion of the association between parental alcohol misuse and own alcohol misuse in adulthood (58% for performance in grade 6, 27% for grade 9 and 30% for grade 12). Moreover, interaction effects appeared to be more important for the outcome than mediation.
Conclusion Above-average school performance among children whose parents misused alcohol seems to reflect processes of resilience with the potential to break the intergenerational transmission of alcohol misuse. Four-way decomposition offers a viable approach to disentangle processes of interaction from mediation, representing a promising avenue for future longitudinal research.
Show all publications by Lauren Bishop at Stockholm University