Maternal Incarceration and Health Risk Behaviors Among Adolescents: A Latent Class Analysis

Most studies on the impact of maternal incarceration on adolescent health risk behaviors have focused on singular, separated behaviors, even though these behaviors often cluster and co-occur. This study used the FFCWS dataset to examine the association between maternal incarceration and the aggregation of health risk behaviors among adolescents. Latent class analysis suggested the four-class model had the optimal model fit. Multinomial logistic regression revealed that the odds of adolescents with maternal incarceration histories being classified into the "high dietary risk behavior," "high insomnia risk behavior," and "high health risk behavior" groups, compared to the "low health risk behavior" group, were 4.02 times, 3.12 times, and 7.80 times those of adolescents without such experience, respectively. Findings contributed to our knowledge of maternal incarceration's collateral consequences and suggested it be considered in bundled interventions targeting adolescents. Future research that disentangles these relationships' underlying explanatory factors and sociodemographic moderators is needed.