Social and Environmental Determinants of Health – SEDH

Topics

• Studies that examine social determinants of biological effects and biomedical and biobehavioral health outcomes using population level data.
• Studies that assess the role of climate and climate-related exposures in biological and biomedical health outcomes using population level data
• Studies that assess the role of exposure to toxicants and contaminants in the indoor as well as outdoor environment on biological and biomedical health outcomes using population level data including exposures from air, water, food, and soil
• Studies that examine the intersection between environmental and social factors that affect biological and biomedical health outcomes using population level data
• Applications may use methodologies and study designs including cohort, case-control, prospective, longitudinal, retrospective, clinical trial, cross-sectional, surveillance, genetics, epigenetics, omics (i.e. genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics, epigenomics, metagenomics) and assessment of gene-environment interactions

Shared Interests and Overlaps

There are shared interests in social epidemiology applications that assess how social environments affect population health with Social Sciences and Population Studies (SSPA/B). Applications that emphasize the identification of social determinants of health and their relationship with biological, biomedical or biobehavioral outcomes including genetic and epigenetic studies are reviewed in SEDH. Applications that emphasize the social and policy determinants of broad population health or demographic outcomes such as well-being, morbidity and mortality and behavioral health outcomes such as depression and economic outcomes are reviewed in SSPA/B.

There are shared interests in geographic and temporal relationship between environmental exposures and human population level health outcomes with the Analytics and Statistics for Population Research Panel B (ASPB). Applications emphasize the application of spatial methodology to assess the contribution of social and environmental exposures to population health outcomes are reviewed in SEDH. Applications that emphasize the development and enhancement of spatial, spatio-temporal, and geospatial for environmental exposure modeling and assessment of related human population health outcomes are reviewed in ASPB.

There are shared interests in environmental epidemiology applications with Reproductive, Perinatal, and Pediatric Health (RPPH). Applications that primarily focus on the characterization of the environmental and/or social determinants as exposures related to reproductive and/or perinatal health outcomes at the human population level are reviewed in SEDH. Applications that primarily focus on reproductive and/or perinatal health outcomes at the population level with consideration for social and environmental factors are reviewed in RPPH.

There are shared interests in social and environmental exposures with other study sections in the Epidemiology and Population Health Branch. Applications that focus on characterizing environmental or social exposures that are associated with multiple biological and biomedical health outcomes in human populations may be reviewed in SEDH. Applications that focus on the study of various health and disease states in populations while incorporating environmental and/or social exposures as risk factors are reviewed in other study sections focused on those diseases and conditions in the Epidemiology and Population Health Branch.

There are shared interests in stress exposures with Mechanisms of Emotion, Stress and Health (MESH).  Applications that emphasize stress as a social determinant of health and its association with biological health outcomes in human subpopulations are reviewed in SEDH.  Applications that take a mostly laboratory-based approach to understanding the biological mechanisms underlying the association between stress and biological outcomes in humans are reviewed in MESH.

There are shared interests in studying the genetic predisposition to disease using population-based samples with Genetics of Health and Disease (GHD).  Applications that emphasize the social or environmental genomics/epigenomic factors related to human diseases or conditions in human subpopulations are reviewed in SEDH. Applications that emphasize the molecular processes underlying the genetic/epigenetic risk factors associated with these disorders are reviewed in GHD.

There are here are shared interests in the epidemiology of toxicant exposures with Environmental Determinants of Disease (EDD). Applications that focus on characterizing the relationship between environmental exposures and human health outcomes at the population level are reviewed in SEDH. Applications that focus on the pharmacological and toxicological mechanisms by which environmental toxicant exposures affect human disease pathogenesis, including studies employing animal models, are reviewed in EDD.