Losing a family member is a uniquely stressful experience that can have lifelong effects on health and well-being. Family loss can place people on the path to poor health in many ways. For example, family loss has been linked to increased:
- Anxiety and psychological distress
- Alcohol and drug use
- Financial and caregiving stress
- Wear and tear on the body (e.g., immune system)
While everyone experiences family loss, widespread differences in life expectancy by race mean that Black Americans experience these types of losses more often and earlier in life than others. Decades of research have consistently shown that Black Americans are at a disadvantage when it comes to health. Yet, very little is known about how experiencing the death of family members adds to this disadvantage.
That’s where the HEALING Project fits in. With support from the National Institute of Aging (R01AG054624), our collaborative group of researchers uses nationally representative data to document patterns of family loss in the United States and to explore how those patterns add to racial disparities in health. Through our research, we hope to provide principled evidence-based knowledge of how family loss affects health and well-being across racial group and in doing so, provide policy makers with the tools to address the significant health disadvantages faced by Black Americans.