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Does having highly educated adult children reduce mortality risks for parents with low educational attainment in Europe?

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Sabater_2019_AS_Highlyeducated_CC.pdf (1.110Mb)
Date
19/07/2019
Author
Sabater, Albert
Graham, Elspeth
Marshall, Alan
Funder
Economic & Social Research Council
Grant ID
ES/K007394/1
Keywords
Mortality
Older parents
Adult children
Intergenerational transfers
Education
H Social Sciences (General)
HQ The family. Marriage. Woman
L Education
3rd-DAS
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Abstract
It is known that the education of significant others may affect an individual’s mortality. This paper extends an emerging body of research by investigating the effect of having highly educated adult children on the longevity of older parents in Europe, especially parents with low educational attainment. Using a sample of 15,015 individuals (6,620 fathers and 8,395 mothers) aged 50 and above, with 1,847 recorded deaths, over a mean follow-up period of 10.9 years from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), we examine whether the well-established socioeconomic gradient in mortality among parents is modified when their adult children have higher educational attainment than their parents. We find that having highly educated adult children is associated with reduced mortality risks for fathers and mothers with low educational attainment, compared to their counterparts whose adult children have only compulsory education. The association is stronger in early older age (ages 50 to 74) than in later older age (ages 75 and over). Part of the association appears to be explained by health behaviours (physical (in)activity) and health status (self-rated health). Our findings suggest that the socioeconomic-mortality gradient among older parents might be better captured using an intergenerational approach that recognises the advantage of having highly educated adult children, especially for fathers and mothers with only compulsory education.
Citation
Sabater , A , Graham , E & Marshall , A 2019 , ' Does having highly educated adult children reduce mortality risks for parents with low educational attainment in Europe? ' , Ageing & Society , vol. First View . https://doi.org/10.1017/S0144686X19000795
Publication
Ageing & Society
Status
Peer reviewed
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0144686X19000795
ISSN
0144-686X
Type
Journal article
Rights
COPYRIGHT: © Cambridge University Press 2019. This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Description
This work was supported by the ESRC Centre for Population Change (grant number ES/K007394/1); and the University of St Andrews.
Collections
  • University of St Andrews Research
URI
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/18132

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