In a prospective birth cohort study of 5295 girls from the UK-based Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC), we examined the association between biological father absence in childhood and age at menarche whilst adjusting for antenatal indicators of socioeconomic disadvantage and maternal characteristics. We also examined whether exposure to maternal depression and financial pro...

To test a proposition central to J. Belsky, L. Steinberg, and P. Draper's (1991) evolutionary theory of socialization-that pubertal maturation plays a role in linking early rearing experience with adolescent sexual risk taking (i.e., frequency of sexual behavior) and, perhaps, other risk taking (e.g., alcohol, drugs, delinquency)-the authors subjected longitudinal data on 433 White, 62 Black, a...

BACKGROUND Age at menarche is considered a reliable prognostic factor for idiopathic scoliosis and varies in different geographic latitudes. Adolescent idiopathic scoliosis prevalence has also been reported to be different in various latitudes and demonstrates higher values in northern countries. A study on epidemiological reports from the literature was conducted to investigate a possible asso...

OBJECTIVE To examine the relationship between growth patterns in early childhood and the onset of menarche before age 12. METHODS The study included 2,083 women from a birth cohort study conducted in the city of Pelotas, Southern Brazil, starting in 1982. Anthropometric, behavioral, and pregnancy-related variables were collected through home interviews. Statistical analyses were performed usi...

BACKGROUND Several studies have shown that girls who undergo menarche at a relatively young age tend to be more obese as adults. However, because childhood (pre-menarcheal) levels of weight and height are associated with an earlier menarche, the increased prevalence of adult obesity among early maturers may largely reflect the persistence of childhood obesity into adulthood. METHODS We examin...

BACKGROUND To examine the effect of in utero exposure to polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and dichlorodiphenyldichloroethylene (DDE) on age at menarche in offspring, we conducted a cohort study over two generations. METHODS Female participants (and their offspring) in a Michigan angler cohort in which organochlorine levels had been determined previously were studied. Of their 213 female offsp...

OBJECTIVE To study the effects of early metformin treatment on menarche, height, and polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) markers. Low-birthweight (LBW) girls with precocious pubarche (PP) are at risk for an early menarche (<12 years), an adult stature below target level, and PCOS. Hyperinsulinemic insulin resistance is thought to be a key factor. DESIGN Open-label, randomized study. SETTING Un...

Background: Offspring sex ratio (OSR) serves as an important social factor, and various other factors are hypothesized to be associated with it, such as maternal diet, time of ovulation and insemination, environmental phenomena, parental age, and infertility treatment. Objectives: This research was performed to assess the association between mothers’ menarche age, first pregnancy age, and sex r...

Menarche signifies the primary event in female puberty and is associated with changes in self-identity. It is not clear whether earlier puberty causes girls to spend less time in education. Observational studies on this topic are likely to be affected by confounding environmental factors. The Mendelian randomization (MR) approach addresses these issues by using genetic variants (such as single ...

OBJECTIVE To assess the average age of menarche in Pakistani girls from different socioeconomic backgrounds. METHODOLOGY This was a cross sectional study design carried out on female students studying in different schools of Karachi in 2014. Girls aged 10-14 years age were included. Schools from all three socio economic strata were selected through random sampling technique from a list of sch...