The Exposome and its Associations with Broad Mental and Physical Health Measures in Early Adolescence

Abstract Environment is key to human development, yet the complex network structure of exposures (i.e., exposome) makes it challenging to investigate. Here, we analyzed data from the Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study – a large, diverse sample of US adolescents (N=11,235, mean age=10.9, 52% male) with phenotyping at multiple levels of environmental exposure. Applying data-driven iterative factor analyses and bifactor modeling, we reduced dimensionality from hundreds of exposures to six exposome subfactors and a general (adverse) exposome factor. These factors revealed quantitative differences among racial and ethnic groups. Exposome factors increased variance explained in mental health by 10-fold (from 38%), over and above other commonly used sociodemographic factors. The general exposome factor was associated with psychopathology (Beta=0.27) and key health-related outcomes: obesity (OR=1.4) and advanced pubertal development (OR=1.3). Findings highlight the exposome’s role in adolescent health and demonstrate the critical need to study environment using the exposome framework.