Work-related stress and well-being in association with epigenetic age acceleration: A Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1966 Study

Anna Freni-Sterrantino*, Giovanni Fiorito, Angelo D’Errico, Oliver Robinson, Marianna Virtanen, Leena Ala-Mursula, Marjo Riitta Järvelin, Justiina Ronkainen, Paolo Vineis

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

11 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Recent evidence indicates consistent association of low socioeconomic status with epigenetic age acceleration, measured from DNA methylation. As work characteristics and job stressors are crucial components of socioeconomic status, we investigated their association with various measures of epigenetic age acceleration.The study population included employed and unemployed men and women (n=604) from the Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1966. We investigated the association of job strain, effort-reward imbalance and work characteristics with five biomarkers of epigenetic aging (Hannum, Horvath, PhenoAge, GrimAge, and DunedinPoAm).Our results indicate few significant associations between work stress indicators and epigenetic age acceleration, limited to a range of ±2 years, and smoking recording the highest effect on GrimAge age acceleration biomarker between current and no smokers (median difference 4.73 years (IQR 1.18, 8.41). PhenoAgeAA was associated with job strain active work (β=-1.301 95%CI -2.391, -0.212), slowing aging of less than 1.5 years, and working as white-collar slowed aging six months (GrimAgeAA β=-0.683, 95%CI -1.264, -0.102) when compared to blue collars. Association was found for working for more than 40 hours per week that increased the aging over 1.5 years, (HorvathAA β =2.058 95%CI 0.517,3.599, HannumAA β=1.567, 95%CI 0.415,2.719).The pattern of associations was different between women and men and some of the estimated effects are inconsistent with current literature. Our results provide the first evidence of association of work conditions with epigenetic aging biomarkers. However, further epidemiological research is needed to fully understand how work-related stress affects epigenetic age acceleration in men and women in different societies.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1128-1144
Number of pages17
JournalAging
Volume14
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2022
Externally publishedYes

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Freni-Sterrantino et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Keywords

  • Dna methylation
  • Effort-reward imbalance
  • Epigenetic age
  • Job strain
  • Work-related well-being

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Work-related stress and well-being in association with epigenetic age acceleration: A Northern Finland Birth Cohort 1966 Study'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this