Can Adolescents Show Biological Resilience? Fathers’ Ethnic-Racial Identities Protect Children Against Epigenetic Age Acceleration Linked to Police Intrusion

Adolescents of color experience accelerated premature aging (e.g., more epigenetic age acceleration) and are disproportionately stopped by the police. To protect their children against the possible physiological stress linked to police intrusion, fathers may have beliefs and practices that reflect their ethnic-racial identities, which may spillover into their interactions with children. To test our theories, we leveraged a longitudinal study of 1,688 fathers and their biological children in the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing study [54% Black, 26% Latino, 20% Other youth of color; 50% girls], adolescents who experienced more police intrusion showed more accelerated epigenetic aging, according to the second-generation epigenetic clocks (i.e., GrimAge, PhenoAge, and DunedinPACE). Fathers’ ethnic-racial identity commitment (but not their exploration) weakened the link between police intrusion and adolescents’ epigenetic age acceleration. Although fathers were sources of resilience for youth, policies and practices need to be amended to reduce police surveillance in youth’s lives.