How mental disorders in youth affect health and outcomes in adulthood

During her AXA Research Fund project, Dr. Jasmine Wertz investigated this hypothesis using data from longitudinal studies tracking mental health and aging indicators, such as declines in sensory, motor, and cognitive functioning, or assessments of apparent aging. A large-scale study conducted on a cohort New Zealand, which followed 2.3 million people over three decades, revealed a significant association between psychiatric illnesses in youth and accelerated aging.

Her research showed that by age 45, individuals with a history of psychiatric symptoms had aged 5.3 years faster than those without, regardless of the specific mental disorder – including ADHD, anxiety, depression, and schizophrenia. These findings suggest that young people with mental health problems, who already face disproportionate challenges in areas like education and social interaction, also experience worse physical health through faster biological aging.

Given these insights, Dr. Wertz emphasizes the importance of better integrating mental health care within general healthcare services. Early intervention and improved mental health support could help reduce the risk of long-term physical illnesses, benefiting both individuals and healthcare systems. Effectively addressing mental health could lead to healthier aging populations and potentially lower overall medical expenses.

During her AXA Research Fund fellowship, she gained recognition from the scientific community, receiving the “Rising Star” Award from the International Association for Psychological Science in 2022.

Her accomplishments include publishing four papers, speaking at eight conferences, and contributing expertise to significant initiatives like the “Deaton Report on Inequality” with the UK Nuffield Foundation and Institute for Fiscal Studies.

Upon completing her grant, she secured her first faculty position as a Lecturer in Psychology at the University of Edinburgh and obtained funding to continue her research. Dr. Wertz will also continue studying the transition to adulthood for vulnerable young people through the Scottish Graduate School of Social Science and Skills Development Scotland. With a strong policy focus, she aims to develop specific solutions for supporting vulnerable young people, including those with mental health challenges, as they move into post-school environments.

 

Read more in open access documents or videos

·         CNN: “People with multiple mental disorders may age several years faster, study finds”

·         Psychology Today: “The Disturbing Link Between Psychiatric Illness and Accelerated Aging”

·         US National Institute on Aging Featured Research : “Mental illnesses in early life linked to faster aging and worse health in later years”

·         The Conversation: The link between mental health problems and later physical health”

·         PUBLICATION 2021 : https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2776612?utm_campaign=articlePDF&utm_medium=articlePDFlink&utm_source=articlePDF&utm_content=jamapsychiatry.2020.4626

·         Deaton Report on Inequality chapter: https://doi.org/10.1093/ooec/odad072

·         Media: https://bold.expert/studying-family-life-may-offer-insights-into-personalised-learning/

Scientific publications

1. Wertz, J., Moffitt, T. E., Blangis, F., Ambler, A., Arseneault, L., Danese, A., Fisher, H.L. & Caspi, A. (in press). Parenting in childhood predicts personality in early adulthood: A longitudinal twin-differences study. American Psychologist.

2. Dahoun, T.,  Peel, A. Baldwin, J. Coleman, O., Lewis, S.J., Wertz, J., Rijsdijk, F., Danese, A. (in press) Genetic and environment influences on childhood victimization: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Molecular Psychiatry. 

3. Tanksley, P. T., Brislin, S. J., Wertz, J., de Vlaming, R., Courchesne-Krak, N. S., Mallard, T. T., Raffington, L. T., Karlsson Linner, R., Koellinger, P., Palmer, A., Sanchez-Roige, A., Waldman, I., Dick, D., Moffitt, T. E., Caspi, A., & Harden, K. P. (in press). Do polygenic indices capture “direct” effects on child externalizing behavior? within-family analyses in two longitudinal birth cohorts. Clinical Psychological Science. 

4. Zhou, Q., Gidziela, A.,  Allegrini, A.G., Cheesman, R. Wertz, J.,  Maxwell, J., Plomin, R. Rimfeld, K., & Malanchini, M. (in press). Gene-environment correlation: The role of family environment in academic development. Molecular Psychiatry.

5. Cattan, S., Fitzsimons, E., Goodman, A., Phimister, A., Ploubidis, G. B., & Wertz, J. (2024). Early childhood inequalities. Oxford Open Economics, 3, i711-i740.

6. Thompson, K.N., Oginni, O., Wertz, J., Danese, A., Okundi, M., Arseneault, L., & Matthews, T. (2024). Social isolation and poor mental health in young people: Testing genetic and environmental influences in a longitudinal cohort study. European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 1-11.

7. Bryan, B.T., Thompson, K.N., Goldman-Mellor, S., Moffitt, T.E., Odgers, C., Long Shin So, S., Uddin Rahmana, M., Wertz, J., Matthews, T., Arseneault, L. (2024). The socioeconomic consequences of loneliness: Evidence from a nationally representative longitudinal study of young adults. Social Science & Medicine, 116697.

8. Wertz, J., Moffitt, T.E., Arseneault, L., Barnes, J.C., Boivin, M., Corcoran, D.L., Danese, A., Hancox, R.J., Harrington, H.L., Houts, R.M., Langevin, S., Liu, H., Poulton, R., Sugden, K., Tanksley, P.T., Williams, B.S., & Caspi, A. (2023). Genetic associations with parental investment from conception to wealth inheritance: 30,000 parents in six cohorts. Nature Human Behaviour, 7, 1388-1401. 

9. Wertz, J., & Lewis, S. J. (2023). Commentary: Something old, something new–can adding genomic data to family studies advance our understanding of the impact of nature and nurture on mental health? Commentary on McAdams et al. (2023). Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 64, 708-710.

10. Wertz, J. (2023). The value of genetically-sensitive Research in understanding links between parenting and child development | Commentary. SRCD Monograph Matters, https://doi.org/10.1111/mono.12460. 

11. Sugden, K., Moffitt, T.E., Arpawong, T.E., Belsky, D.W., Corcoran, D.L., Crimmins, E.M., Hannon, E., Houts, R., Mill, J.S., Poulton, R., Ramrakha, S., Wertz, J., Williams, B.S., Caspi, A. (2023). Cross-national and cross-generational evidence that educational attainment may slow the pace of aging in European-descent individuals. The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, gbad056.

12. Vyas, N., Wimberly, C. E., Beaman, M. M., Kaplan, S. J., Rasmussen, L. J., Wertz, J., ... & Walsh, K. M. (2023). Systematic review and meta-analysis of the effect of adverse childhood Experiences (ACEs) on brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) levels. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 106071.

13. Bourassa, K. J., Harrington, H. L., Houts, R. M., Poulton, R., Ramrakha, S., Rasmussen, L. J. H., Wertz, J., Moffitt, T. E., & Caspi, A. (2022). Childhood adversity and midlife health: Shining a light on the black box of potential psychosocial mechanisms. Prevention Science, 1-12. 

14. Kretschmer, T., Vrijen, C., Nolte, I.M., Wertz, J., Hartmann, C.A. (2022). Gene-environment interplay in externalizing behaviour from childhood through adulthood. Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry, 63, 1206-1213. 

15. Agnew-Blais, J.C., Wertz, J., Arseneault, L., Belsky, D.W., Danese, A., Pingault, J.B., Polanczyk, G.V., Sugden, K., Williams, B., Moffitt, T.E. (2022). Mother’s and children’s ADHD genetic risk, household chaos and children’s ADHD symptoms: A gene-environment correlation study. Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry, 63, 1153-1163

16. Grunewald, K., Deng, J., Wertz, J., & Schweizer, S. (2022). The effect of online social evaluation on mood and cognition in young people. Scientific Reports, 12, 1-11.

17. Wertz, J., Caspi, A., Ambler, A., Broadbent, J., Hancox, R.J., Harrington, H., Hogan, S., Houts, R.M., Leung, J.H., Poulton, R., Purdy, S.C., Ramrakha, S., Hartmann Rasmussen, L.J., Richmond-Rakerd, L.S., Thorne, P.R., Wilson, G.A., & Moffitt, T.E. (2021). Association of history of psychopathology with accelerated aging at midlife. JAMA Psychiatry, 78, 530-539.  

18. Wertz, J., Israel, S., Arseneault, L., Belsky, D.W., Bourassa, K.J., Harrington, H., Houts, R., Poulton, R., Richmond-Rakerd, L.S., Røysamb, E., Moffitt, T.E., & Caspi, A. (2021). The vital personality and healthy aging: Replicated life-course evidence about measurement, correlates, and familial transmission. Social Science & Medicine, 285, 114283.  

19. Ganesan, K., Shakoor, S., Wertz, J., Agnew-Blais, J., Bowes, L., Jaffee, S.R., Matthews, T., Arseneault, L., (2021). Bullying behaviours and other conduct problems: Longitudinal investigation of their independent associations with risk factors and later outcomes. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology, 56, 2041–2052.  

20. von Stumm, S., & Wertz, J. (2021). Who's learning? Using within-family studies to understand personalized learning. NPJ Learning, 6.  

21. Agnew-Blais, J., Belsky, D., Caspi, A., Danese, A., Moffitt, T.E., Polanczyk, G., Sugden, K., Williams, B., Wertz, J., Lewis, C., Arseneault, L. (2021). Polygenic risk and the course of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder from childhood to young adulthood: Findings from a nationally-representative cohort. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 60, 1147-1156.  

22. Mason, D., Ronald, A., Ambler, A., Caspi, A., Houts, R., Poulton, R., Ramrakha, S., Wertz, J., Moffitt, T. E., & Happé, F. (in press) Autistic traits are associated with faster pace of aging: Evidence from the Dunedin study at age 45. Autism Research, 14, 1684-1694.  

23. Armstrong-Carter, E., Wertz, J., & Domingue, B. (2021). Genetics and child development: New discoveries and their implications for developmental research. Child Development Perspectives, 15, 57-64.  

24. Demange, P.A., Malanchini, M., Mallard, T.T., Biroli, P., Cox, S.R., Grotzinger, A.D., Tucker-Drob, E.M., Abdellaoui A., Arseneault, L., Caspi, A., Corcoran, D., Domingue, B., Mitchell, C., van Bergen, E., Boomsma, D.I., Harris, K.M., Hill, F.I., Moffitt, T.E., Poulton, R., Prinz, J., Sugden, K., Wertz, J., Williams, B., de Zeeuw, E.L., Belsky, D.W., Harden, K.P., Nivard, M.G. (2021). Investigating the genetic architecture of non-cognitive skills using GWAS-by-subtraction. Nature Genetics, 53, 35-44. 

25. Richmond-Rakerd, L.S., Caspi, A., Ambler, A., d’Arbeloff, T., de Bruine, M., Elliott, M., Harrington, H., Hogan, S., Houts, R.M., Ireland, D., Keenan, R., Knodt, A.R., Melzer, T.R., Park, S., Poulton, R., Ramrakha, S., Hartmann Rasmussen, L.J., Sack, E., Schmidt, A.T., Sison, M.L., Wertz, J., Hariri, A.R., & Moffitt, T.E. (2021). Childhood self-control forecasts the pace of midlife aging and preparedness for old age. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 118, e2010211118. 

26. Wertz, J., Caspi, A., Ambler, A., Arseneault, L., Belsky, D.W., Danese, A., Fisher, H., Matthews, T., Richmond-Rakerd, L., & Moffitt, T.E. (2020). Adolescent borderline symptoms signal risk for poor outcomes in early adulthood: Findings from a genetically sensitive longitudinal cohort study. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 59, 1165-1177.

27. Caspi, A., Ambler, A., Belsky, D.W., Elliott, M., Harari, A., Harrington, H., Hogan, S., Houts, R., Poulton, R., Reuben, A., Ramrakha, S., Rasmussen, L.J.H., Richmond-Rakerd, L.S., Sugden, K., Wertz, J., Williams, B., & Moffitt, T.E. (2020). Longitudinal assessment of mental health disorders and comorbidities across 4 decades among participants in the Dunedin Birth Cohort Study. JAMA Network Open, 3, e203221-e203221.