Attending an HBCU Linked to Better Health for Black Students
Attending an historically Black college or university (HBCU)—or even living in close proximity to an HBCU—is linked to better later-life cognitive outcomes for Black Americans, according to a recent study by 10 co-authors from Rutgers University, the University of Alabama at Birmingham, Columbia University, Boston University and Harvard University in JAMA Network Open, a journal published by the American Medical Association.
The study was co-authored by lead author Marilyn D. Thomas, Ph.D., assistant professor at University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) Weill Institute for Neurosciences; Jennifer J. Manly, Ph.D., professor of neuropsychology, Gertrude H. Sergievsky Center and the Taub Institute for Research on Alzheimer’s Disease and the Aging Brain, Columbia University; Christina Mangurian, MD, vice dean for faculty & academic affairs, UCSF School of Medicine, professor of psychiatry & behavioral sciences and epidemiology & biostatistics; Rita Hamad, professor of social epidemiology and public policy, social and behavioral sciences, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health; and additional researchers and faculty.
Creating culturally affirming spaces can help promote and protect long-lasting cognitive health, the study highlighted.
Higher education is a strong social determinant of reduced risk of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD), according to an article from Alzheimer’s Association. But there are disparities—higher education may not offer equal cognitive reserve protection against ADRD risk for Black adults compared with White adults, particularly in areas of memory and language cognition, according to the study. These discrepancies led the 10 co-authors to research HBCUs as a promising example of educational sources of resilience that impact Black adults differentially than the general population.
“Legal school segregation has been linked to poor health outcomes, including cognition,” the study stated. “Jim Crow laws created social and economic inequalities in schooling, housing, labor and health care that unfairly disadvantage Black individuals over the life course.”
But exposure to HBCUs can help mitigate the later-life adverse health effects related to racial segregation and discrimination in education (1964), according to the study. Additionally, the enforcement of the 1964 Civil Rights Act is associated with improved health among Black individuals and communities, it explained.
The study found that Black HBCU college-goers had a lower risk of developing metabolic syndrome, a cluster of metabolic disturbances associated with ADRD progression. The cognitive benefits for aging Black adults associated with attending an HBCU versus a predominantly White institution (PWI) were better memory, language and global cognition.
“We found that HBCU attendance was associated with better cognition compared with PWI attendance for aging Black adults, an association that held for those attending college before and after legal racial segregation and sanctioned racial discrimination in education,” the study concludes. “HBCU attendance is a novel method to operationalize Black educational experiences as a source of resilience against a disproportionate risk of ADRD in health equity research.”
Using data from the “National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health”, the co-authors found a correlation between the HBCU environment and long-term wellness in a sample of 1,978 Black students who attended college between 1940 and 1980 (35% attended an HBCU). The study also measured Black students who attended a high school in a state with an HBCU.
The co-authors also used data from the “Reasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke” study, a prospective cohort study that recruited Black and White U.S. adults aged 45 years and older during 2003 to 2007. The national cohort oversampled Black residents from the Stroke Belt, a group of eight Southern states defined by excess stroke mortality; the analytic sample included Black participants who attended high school in a state with an HBCU and attended college.
The study also highlighted that Black students at HBCUs versus PWIs develop a greater sense of belonging, build stronger social networks and engage in healthier behaviors to cope with stressors. HBCU students report lower rates of depression and anxiety and higher rates of positive mental health, compared with national estimates—which may improve the benefits of cognitive reserve, according to the study. Black students attending PWIs often report experiences of anti-Black bias and discrimination—these psychosocial stressors can provoke inflammation and oxidative stress, which can contribute to ADRD development, the study explained.
The study found that, during childhood, HBCU attendees were more likely than PWI attendees to have had a mother or female caregiver with a college education (19.3% vs 8.5%); received encouragement to succeed in school (72.1% vs 57.4%); have been shown love and affection (66.8% vs 60.8%); and to live in a state with a larger Black population (25.3% vs 21.5%) and greater poverty (22.0% vs 19.4%). “The powerful impact of Black caregiver love, affection and academic encouragement may be uniquely relevant for Black HBCU attendees,” the study stated.
“Federal resources have been reallocated recently to enhance the success and effectiveness of HBCUs, creating an opportunity to grow our understanding of the health implications of HBCU attendance,” the study stated.
The co-authors highlight future areas of potential research:
- Nationally representative panel studies on cognition could help explore HBCU impacts on cognitive decline for Black Americans.
- Additional studies can assess whether HBCU attendance may improve ADRD outcomes and inequities by increasing health-promoting resources and reducing vascular risk of ADRD.
- Investigate the direct effects of early-life sociocultural and academic encouragement on cognition in later-life Black adults.
- Examining other aspects of HBCUs—such as prestige, faculty racial composition and funding—could help explain how these institutions may differentially advantage Black adults.
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