Samuel H. Preston

The Changing Relation between Mortality and level of Economic Development

Summary A very simple technique has been used to shed light on a number of questions about the influence of economic level on national mortality trends and differentials. Scatter-diagrams of the cross-sectional relation between national income per head and life expectancy are developed for three decades during the twentieth, century. The relations established appear to shift systematically during the century. In general, in order to attain a certain life expectancy between 40 and 60 a nation requires an income level almost three times greater in the 1930s than in the 1960s This shift is corroborated by a changing structure of mortality by cause of death for populations at equivalent mortality levels. The magnitude of the shifts, combined with regional income data suggests that some 75–90 per cent of the growth in life expectancy for the world as a whole over these three decades is attributable to factors exogenous to a nations contemporary level of income Through similar techniques, improved nutrition an...

Educational differentials in mortality: United States, 1979–1985

The paper examines educational differentials in adult mortality in the United States within a multivariate framework using data from the National Longitudinal Mortality Survey (NLMS). As a preliminary step we compare the magnitude of educational mortality differentials in the United States to those documented in Europe. At ages 35-54, the proportionate reductions in mortality for each one year increase in schooling are similar in the United States to those documented in Europe. The analyses further reveal significant educational differentials in U.S. mortality among both men and women in the early 1980s. Differentials are larger for men and for working ages than for women and persons age 65 and above. These differentials persist but are reduced in magnitude when controls for income, marital status and current place of residence are introduced.

Demography of Aging

As the United States and the rest of the world face the unprecedented challenge of aging populations, this volume draws together for the first time state-of-the-art work from the emerging field of the demography of aging. The nine chapters, written by experts from a variety of disciplines, highlight data sources and research approaches, results, and proposed strategies on a topic with major policy implications for labor forces, economic well-being, health care, and the need for social and family supports.

Childhood conditions that predict survival to advanced ages among African-Americans

This paper investigates the social and economic circumstances of childhood that predict the probability of survival to age 85 among African-Americans. It uses a unique study design in which survivors are linked to their records in U.S. Censuses of 1900 and 1910. A control group of age and race-matched children is drawn from Public Use Samples for these censuses. It concludes that the factors most predictive of survival are farm background, having literate parents, and living in a two-parent household. Results support the interpretation that death risks are positively correlated over the life cycle.

Sex Mortality Differences in the United States: The Role of Cohort Smoking Patterns

This article demonstrates that over the period 1948–2003, sex differences in mortality in the age range 50–84 widened and then narrowed on a cohort basis rather than on a period basis. The cohort with the maximum excess of male mortality was born shortly after the turn of the century. Three separate data sources suggest that the turnaround in sex mortality differences is consistent with sex differences in cigarette smoking by cohort. An age-period-cohort model reveals a highly significant effect of smoking histories on men’s and women’s mortality. Combined with recent changes in smoking patterns, the model suggests that sex differences in mortality will narrow dramatically in coming decades.

Effects of family composition on mortality differentials by sex among children in Matlab Bangladesh.

The Matlab Demographic Surveillance System of the International Center for Diarrheal Disease Research Bangladesh (ICDDRB) in 1981-82 was used to determine whether sex differences in mortality varied with socioeconomic family conditions or whether major maternal and child health interventions reduced the effect. It was hypothesized that large numbers of children of the same sex in families will be associated with higher child mortality of that sex. Socioeconomic data were obtained from the 1982 Matlab Census. Univariate models were developed and parameters estimated with the PROC LOGIST procedure of the Statistical Analysis System (SAS). Sex differentials appear at >6 months. The total number of observations pooled across age intervals (.5-1 and annually to 5 years) is 57937. 50% of the births occurred in the treatment area. The results for the univariate tabulations show that girls with surviving older sisters have at every age higher death rates than girls without older siblings or with older sons. Having >2 sisters is not a greater disadvantage but having mixed-sex sibships does increase girls mortality. Boys with older male siblings follow the same pattern but to a lesser extent. Girls mortality is more than double that of boys at all 3 ages. There is a high mortality rate for males up to 1 year. Having an older brother in addition to an older sister increases mortality in only 2 out of 6 cases but having more than 1 older brother is worse than having only 1. In the multivariate analysis the log odds of dying are higher for females by .436 and the presence of 1 older sister raises mortality significantly to .558 vs. no siblings (>2 sisters is .573). The log odds of dying are higher for sisters having older brothers vs. no siblings or boys having older brothers. Boys with older sisters have lower mortality. The addition of socioeconomic and residential variables has little effect on the family composition coefficients. Child mortality is higher among the following groups: families with very little dwelling space per capita; families that do not own a radio bicycle watch quilt and lamp or received remittances; and families with an unschooled mother. Treatment area residence significantly lowers child mortality for both sexes equally. Mothers with some schooling offer the same advantage as living in a treatment area. But the presence of an older sister is the most important determinant. Female mortality is somewhat lower in poorer families. The effects of the family planning program on birth order distributions are likely to accumulate over time. The major conclusion is that high female mortality is due to conscious selective neglect.

Are Educational Differentials in Adult Mortality Increasing in the United States

Two recent studies have compared the size of educational mortality differentials among adults in the 1980s to estimates for 1960. Both studies have concluded that educational differentials have increased for males. One study finds a similar increase for females. We reconsider this question by introducing a data source that is better suited to estimating recent differentials than either of the two that have been employed. We also evaluate the quality of the 1960 baseline estimates and introduce broader measures of inequality. We conclude that educational inequalities have widened for males but contracted for working-age females. For both sexes, inequality trends are more adverse for persons aged 65+ than for persons aged 25-64. The role of national health insurance in shaping these trends is briefly considered.

Age, Period, and Cohort Effects in Demography: A Review

This paper considers only the vital events of demographic measurement, the factors influencing the rate at which those events occur and then investigates the consequences of patterns of these events. It reviews the state of the art of age, period and cohort analysis for demographic dependent variables. Major examples of such analyses are given in both mortality and fertility studies. In the area of mortality the conventional approach to such analysis apears to be well suited to a wide range of applications yielding useful results. The reasons for this suitability are: early childhood experience is important in many major disease and death processes, so that cohorts are legitimately viewed as acquiring early on a certain fixed susceptibility; data sometimes stretch back far enough that stationary standards of age patterns can be developed empirically, and applied to later experience; and, logarithmic or logistic transformations linearize comparisons of age schedules or mortality so that standard statistical procedures are suitable. Applications of age, period, and cohort analysis are not always routine; external constraints are required, in the form of theoretically based and mathematically expressed age patterns of mortality, in order to distinguish effectively between period and cohort effects. A set of models of age patterns of mortality that are based on cohort as well as period experience could be constructed with useful applications. With fertility analysis the conventional approach is much less suitable. Once goal directed behavior is introduced, empirical examinations must be based on theories or assumptions about how such goals are formulated and pursued. Conventional analysis might suffice only if one is prepared to accept the assumption that all pertinent goals and strategies are formulated before the initiation of childbearing and remain unaffected by subsequent events. This assumption is untenable for modern developed populations and the forms of analysis appropriate to age period cohort investigations of fertility will have to develop along with theories of reproductive behavior.

African-american mortality at older ages: Results of a matching study

In this paper we investigate the quality of age reporting on death certificates of elderly African-Americans. We link a sample of death certificates of persons age 65+ in 1985 to records for the same individuals in U.S. censuses of 1900, 1910, and 1920 and to records of the Social Security Administration. The ages at death reported on death certificates are too young on average. Errors are greater for women than for men. Despite systematic underreporting of age at death, too many deaths are registered at ages 95+. This excess reflects an age distribution of deaths that declines steeply with age, so that the base for upward transfers into an age category is much larger than the base for transfers downward and out. When corrected ages at death are used to estimate age-specific death rates, African-American mortality rates increase substantially above age 85 and the racial “crossover” in mortality disappears. Uncertainty about white rates at ages 95+, however, prevents a decisive racial comparison at the very oldest ages.

Urban French Mortality in the Nineteenth Century

Summary Following population reconstructions, age-specific death rates and life tables are computed for five-year periods during 1816-1905 for the three largest urban departements of France. During the early decades of the period, life expectancy at birth in the urban departements is about five to ten years lower than that of France as a whole. At some point after the mid-century, the gap in each of the three is reduced. However, the timing of accelerated mortality reduction varies considerably and appears to be related to the timing of improvements in water supply and sewerage. This inference is supported by cross-sectional and time series records on causes of death. In Bouches-du-Rhone, where water-support systems were not modernised until the 1890s, life expectancy in 1871-90 was only 1-5 years higher than in 1816-45; and water- and food-borne diseases account for a major amount of its disadvantage relative to the other departements. A striking tendency is revealed for mortality gains after mid-century...