C. Shannon Stokes

Income Inequality and Mortality in US Counties: Does Minority Racial Concentration Matter?

UNLABELLED This study examined (1) the relationship between income inequality and mortality among all counties in the contiguous United States to ascertain whether the relationships found for states and metropolitan areas extend to smaller geographic units and (2) the influence of minority racial concentration on the inequality-mortality linkage. METHODS This county-level ecologic analysis used data from the Compressed Mortality Files and the US Census. Weighted least squares regression models of age-, sex-, and race-adjusted county mortality rates were estimated to examine the additive and interactive effects of income inequality and minority racial concentration. RESULTS Higher income inequality at the county level was significantly associated with higher total mortality. Higher minority racial concentration also was significantly related to higher mortality and interacted with income inequality. CONCLUSIONS The relationship between income inequality and mortality is robust for counties in the United States. Minority concentration interacts with income inequality, resulting in higher mortality in counties with low inequality and a high percentage of Blacks than in counties with high inequality and a high percentage of Blacks.

Are there crisis-led fertility declines? Evidence from central Cameroon.

Past demographic transitions have beenobserved with and without economic progress, but thereis little empirical record of crisis-driven fertilitytransitions. In recent years, several authors haveargued that conditions for such transitions are met inAfrican countries under economic crisis and structuraladjustment. Using retrospective family histories,this study examines fertility responses to crisis inCameroon, a country with a particularly abrupteconomic reversal. The thesis of a crisis-led declineis tested on the basis of five criteria includingtiming of the decline, statistical and substantivesignificance, rural-urban response differentials andsocial salience. Findings are consistent with acrisis-led effect.

Differential Neonatal and Postneonatal Infant Mortality Rates Across US Counties: The Role of Socioeconomic Conditions and Rurality

PURPOSE To examine differences in correlates of neonatal and postneonatal infant mortality rates, across counties, by degree of rurality. METHODS Neonatal and postneonatal mortality rates were calculated from the 1998 to 2002 Compressed Mortality Files from the National Center for Health Statistics. Bivariate analyses assessed the relationship between neonatal and postneonatal mortality by Urban Influence (UI) codes. Multivariable, weighted least-squares regression models included measures of county socioeconomic conditions, health services and environmental risks. FINDINGS The bivariate analysis indicated neonatal and postneonatal mortality was significantly higher in the most nonmetropolitan counties compared to the most metropolitan counties. However the relationship was not linear across the Urban Influence codes. In the multivariable models, a nonmetropolitan advantage was observed for counties not adjacent to metropolitan areas for neonatal mortality. However, postneonatal mortality rates were higher in the most rural nonmetropolitan counties. CONCLUSIONS Certain characteristics of nonmetropolitan counties not adjacent to metropolitan counties and with an urban area of 2,500 population or more are protective against neonatal mortality (UI = 7, UI = 8). This may indicate that just having access to health services is more important to creating a protective effect for these nonmetropolitan counties than having a high concentration of medical facilities. The nonmetropolitan, not adjacent (UI = 9) disadvantage observed for postneonatal mortality supports the idea that the isolation of these areas combined with the combination of risk factors across the most nonmetropolitan counties leads to poorer postneonatal health outcomes in these areas.

Is the Relationship Between Landholding and Fertility Spurious? A Response to Cain

This paper reviews the relationship between landholdings and fertility. Two dimensions of land are identified as salient for fertility behaviour: size of operational holdings and land ownership. It is suggested that these two dimensions and the resulting income streams have disparate effects on fertility. Size of holdings is assumed to have a positive influence on fertility due to the greater labour demands of larger holdings, while land ownership is posited to exert a negative long-term effect because of the increase in old-age security associated with the income returns to equity. In addition to these effects on the demand for children, landholding is also thought to influence the supply of children. A systematic review of the literature finds support for the impact of both dimensions of landholding on fertility preferences, contraceptive behaviour, the proximate determinants and fertility. Both the demand and supply of children appear to be influenced by landholdings. The observed regularities suggest ...

Ethnic differences in sexual behaviour among unmarried adolescents and young adults in Zimbabwe.

Understanding the social and cultural contextual determinants of sexual behaviour of adolescents and young adults is an essential step towards curtailing the spread of HIV. This study examined the effects of one cultural factor, ethnicity, on sexual abstinence, faithfulness, condom use at last sex, and risky sex among young people in Zimbabwe. Data from the cross-sectional, population-based 2005-06 Zimbabwe Demographic and Health Survey were used. Net of the effect of sociodemographic and social-cognitive factors, and using multinomial logistic regression, ethnicity was found to have a strong and consistent effect on sexual behaviour among youth. In addition, the study found that there were ethnic-specific and within-gender differences in sexual behaviour, for both men and women. Shona youth were more likely to be abstinent than Ndebele youth. Compared with Shona youth, Ndebele youth were more likely to have engaged in risky sex. However, Ndebele men were more likely have used condoms at last sex, compared with Shona men. For both men and women, sexual behaviour was more socially controlled. School attendance and religion exerted protective effects on sexual abstinence. For men only, those living in rural areas were less likely to be faithful and more likely to have engaged in risky sexual behaviour than those living in urban areas. The study attests to the fact that ethnic norms and ideologies of sexuality need to be identified and more thoroughly understood. In addition, the study provides evidence that in order to promote safe and healthy sexuality among young people in Zimbabwe, cultural, social and gender-specific approaches to the development of HIV prevention strategies should be seriously considered. Current success in the Abstinence, Being faithful and Condom use (ABC) approach could be strengthened by recognizing and responding to cultural forces that reproduce and perpetuate risky sexual behaviours.

Agricultural chemical use and cancer mortality in selected rural counties in the U.S.A.

Abstract The relationship between agricultural chemical use and five major , categories of cancer is examined for a sample of rural U.S. counties. County acreages treated with insecticides, herbicides and fertilizers are the variables of primary analytic interest. Findings suggest that agricultural chemical use is related to county cancer mortality. For three of the five categories of cancer included, agricultural chemical use was the best predictor of cancer mortality. Although limitations common to ecological analyses require caution in interpreting results, the findings are highly suggestive of the need for additional research on possible links between agricultural chemical use and county cancer mortality.

Southern traditionalism and sex-role ideology: A research note

Sociological literature, as well as popular folklore, suggests the existence of a Southern regional subculture, of which sex-role traditionalism is an integral part. To test the empirical validity of this assumption, the present study employed the 1975 National Fertility Study data, a probability sample of 3,403 currently married white women, of whom eight sex-role questions were asked. A factor analysis of these questions was used to calculate a sex-role summary score for each respondent. Wifes employment in 1975 and her attainment of high levels of education were the two strongest predictors of a nontraditional sex-role score. The sex-role attitudes of Southern and non-Southern women did not differ significantly. The implications for research and policy are discussed.

Teenage fertility, socioeconomic status and infant mortality

This paper examines the relationship between infant mortality and a complex measure of socioeconomic status for evidence of diminution. In data on counties in the US with a minimum of 20 infant deaths over the 5-year period 1971-75 no evidence of a declining relationship between socioeconomic status and infant mortality was found. Both level of community affluence and racial composition of the population exerted direct effects on levels of infant deaths. In addition both socioeconomic status and racial composition exhibited indirect effects which operated through teenage childbearing. When total infant mortality was subdivided teenage fertility serves as a mediating variable in the link between socioeconomic status and neonatal mortality but not for the postneonatal components. Given the nearly equivalent total effect of socioeconomic status on infant mortality it is concluded that the classic division into neonatal (supposedly a function of biological and genetic agents) and postneonatal (traditionally attributed to social and environmental agents) may be too crude to allow the contemporary effects of the socioenvironmental milieu to be evaluated effectively. (authors modified)

Agricultural policies and human fertility: some emerging connections.

Increasing agricultural output and slowing population growth are important policy goals of many developing nations. This article explores the idea that fertility of farm families may be influenced by the policies and programs introduced in rural areas to increase agricultural output. Specifically, the article provides an initial framework for identifying the links between agricultural policy and fertility, and reviews empirical studies regarding connections between human fertility and policies designed to influence agricultural production in rural areas.

Family structure and socio-economic differentials in fertility

Abstract The long standing research on the relation of socio-economic status and fertility has recently given way to a focus on those factors which account for class differentials. Although class differences in fertility seem to be diminishing, the basic relationship remains inverse.2 In an attempt to explain class differentials in fertility, researchers have begun to look at such variables as age at marriage3, value orientations4, and non-fiunilial activity.5 Bumpass demonstrated that age at marriage is an interaction variable which greatly attenuates the relationship between social class and fertility. He found that the relationship was inverse among women marrying before age 19, but direct among women who were 23 years or older at first marriage. Clifford examined value orientations as an intervening variable in the socio-economic status-fertility relationship. Modern and traditional value orientations did aid in interpreting the relationship, but other factors were also operative. Kupinsky found that ...Abstract The long standing research on the relation of socio-economic status and fertility has recently given way to a focus on those factors which account for class differentials. Although class differences in fertility seem to be diminishing, the basic relationship remains inverse.(2) In an attempt to explain class differentials in fertility, researchers have begun to look at such variables as age at marriage(3), value orientations(4), and non-fiunilial activity.(5) Bumpass demonstrated that age at marriage is an interaction variable which greatly attenuates the relationship between social class and fertility. He found that the relationship was inverse among women marrying before age 19, but direct among women who were 23 years or older at first marriage. Clifford examined value orientations as an intervening variable in the socio-economic status-fertility relationship. Modern and traditional value orientations did aid in interpreting the relationship, but other factors were also operative. Kupinsky found that the non-familial activity of women decidedly influenced socio-economic differentials infertility. Thelabour force participation of women had a greater effect on reducing fertility among upper-status women than among those of lower status. This relationship was also influenced by the rural-urban background of the women.