The Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA)

Site: https://www.mesa-nhlbi.org

Updated 5/30/22

Country: United States

Study design: Observational cohort with repeated measurements over time

Participant age range:

  • Early adulthood or midlife
  • Aging adults

Number of participants at baseline: 6,814 adults aged 45-84

Year of initial enrollment: 2000

Number of data collection waves: 6 primary, > 20 secondary; data collection ongoing

Measures of well-being:

  • Optimism
  • Social support / integration / cohesion

Quantity of well-being measures (e.g., number of constructs, number of times well-being was assessed): Low

Quality of well-being measures (e.g., were measures reliable and valid in the study population): High

Measures of physical health: 

  • Self-rated / questionnaire-based health
  • Self-report medical history or medication use
  • Measured anthropometrics, e.g., weight
  • Biomarkers
  • Genetics
  • Adjudicated health outcomes

Access Information:

This dataset is available to all researchers.

Researchers are required to apply to access this data.

No fees are required to access this dataset.

Notable citation:

Hernandez R, Kershaw K, Siddique J, Boehm J, Kubzansky L, Diez-Roux A, Ning H, & Lloyd-Jones D. (2015). Optimism and cardiovascular health: multi-ethnic study of atherosclerosis (MESA). Health behavior and policy review, 2(1), 62-73.