Psychological resilience predicting cardiometabolic conditions in adulthood in the Midlife in the United States Study

Significance Experiencing early life adversity may negatively impact mental health; however, many of these individuals display psychological resilience or positive psychological health despite experiences of early adversity. This positive capacity for mental health may extend to physical health benefits, including lower cardiometabolic disease. While research suggests that early adversity increases later disease risk, we found that individuals who display psychological resilience to early adversity did not have higher odds of developing cardiometabolic disease. Indeed, those who showed psychological resilience had similar odds of disease to peers who did not experience early adversity. These findings were also reflected in measures of biological cardiometabolic risk. Overall, findings suggest that individuals who manifest psychological resilience may have lower cardiometabolic disease risk later in life.