Family Network and Mortality: Survival Chances through the Lifespan of an Entire Age Cohort

Abstract

This study relates certain family network variables (marital status and number of children) to chances of survival. Through multivariate analysis, survival is also related to social class, social mobility, migration and local environment, and legitimacy of birth. All persons in a local birth cohort born in the years 1902 and 1903 were followed in population records from birth until eighty years of age. The group comprised 487 individuals with a dropout rate of 4 percent.

Univariate survival analysis between twenty to eighty years of age showed widows and also divorced women to have a significantly higher survival than those still married and never married. Never married men and women had the lowest survival rates. The number of children was not associated with survival for neither men nor women when controlled for marital status.

Multiple regression survival analysis showed different patterns for males and females. The risk of not surviving to eighty years of age for men resulted from a combination of being single, downward social mobility, a father in the manual working class group and few children, with being single as the strongest predictor. For women the strongest predictor for death before eighty was the category single and/or married (as opposed to earlier married). The combination of being single/married, high migration, earlier life mainly in rural areas, and having few children were predictors in the model of death before eighty. Thus, for both men and women marital status was the strongest predictor for survival but in different ways.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Cohen

and Syme

G. M.

, Issues in the Study and Application of Social Support, in Social Support and Health, Cohen

and Syme

G. M.

(eds.), Academic Press, New York, pp. 3–22, 1985.

Biegel

D. E.

Shore

B. K.

, and Gordon

, Building Support Networks for the Elderly, Sage, London, pp. 14–15, 1986.

Walker

K. N.

McBride

, and Vachon

M. L. S.

, Social Support Networks and the Crisis of Bereavement, Social Science Medicine, 11:1, p. 35, 1977.

Krause

, Issues of Measurement and Analysis in Studies of Social Support, Aging and Health, in Aging, Stress and Health, Markides

K. S.

and Cooper

C. L.

(eds.), John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., pp. 52–61, 1990.

Bengtsson

, Families and Aging: Diversity and Heterogeneity, in Handbook of Aging and the Social Sciences, (3rd Edition), Academic Press, San Diego, pp. 269–273, 1990.

Antonucci

T. C.

, Social Supports and Social Relationships, in Handbook of Aging and the Social Sciences, (3rd Edition), Academic Press, San Diego, p. 207, 1990.

Sussman

M. B.

, The Family Life of Old People, in Handbook of Aging and the Social Sciences, Binstock

R. H.

and Shanas

(eds.), Van Nostrand, New York, p. 240, 1976.

Berkman

L. F.

and Syme

S. L.

, Social Networks, Host Resistance and Mortality: A Nine-year Follow-up Study of Allameda County Residents, American Journal of Epidemiology, 109, pp. 186–204, 1979.

Taylor

R. C.

and Ford

E. G.

, The Elderly at Risk. A Critical Examination of Commonly Identified Risk Factors, Journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners, 33, pp. 699–705, 1983.

10.

House

J. S.

and Kahn

L. R.

, Measures and Concepts of Social Support, in Social Support and Health, Cohen

and Syme

S. L.

(eds.), Academic Press Inc., London, 1985.

11.

Cassel

, The Contribution of the Social Environment to Host Resistance, American Journal of Epidemiology, 104, p. 107, 1976.

12.

House

J. S.

Landis

K. R.

, and Umberson

, Social Relationships and Health, Science, 241, pp. 540–545, 1988.

13.

Caplan

and Kililica

, Support Systems and Mutual Help, Grune & Stratton, New York, 1976.

14.

House

J. S.

and Kahn

L. R.

, Measures and Concepts of Social Support, in Social Support and Health, Chapter 5, Cohen

and Syme

S. L.

(eds.), Academic Press, Inc., London, 1985.

15.

Stroebe

, Bereavement and Health, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 151–167, 1987.

16.

MacIntyre

, The Pattern of Health by Position in Contemporary Britain: Directions for Sociological Research, Social Science Medicine, 23, p. 395, 1986.

17.

Helsing

K. J.

and Szklo

, Mortality After Bereavement, American Journal of Epidemiology, 114, p. 41–52, 1981.

18.

Mellström

Nilsson

Å.

Odén

Rundgren

Å.

, and Svanborg

, Mortality among Widowed in Sweden, Scandinavia Journal of Social Medicine, 10, pp. 333–341, 1982.

19.

Bowling

and Charlton

, Risk Factors for Mortality After Bereavement: A Logistic Regression Analysis, Journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners, 37, pp. 551–554, 1987.

20.

Bowling

, Mortality after Bereavement: A Review of the Literature on Survival Periods and Factors Affecting Survival, Social Science Medicine, 24:2, pp. 17–124, 1987.

21.

Gove

W. R.

, Sex, Marital Status, and Mortality, American Journal of Sociology, 79:1, pp. 60–63, 1973.

22.

Fox

A. J.

Goldblatt

P. O.

, and Jones

D. R.

, Social Class Mortality Differentials, Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 39, pp. 1–6, 1985.

23.

Syme

S. L.

and Berkman

L. F.

, Social Class, Susceptibility and Sickness, American Journal of Epidemiology, 104:1, 1976.

24.

Wilkingson

R. G.

, Socio-economic Differences in Mortality: Interpreting the Data on Their Size and Trends, in Class and Health, Wilkingson

R. G.

(ed.), Tavistock Publications, London, p. 1, 1986.

25.

Lehr

Schmitz-Scherzer

, and Zimmerman

E. J.

, Vergleiche von Überlebenden und Verstorbenen in der Bonner Gerontologischen Längsschnittstudie (BOLSA), in Lehr

and Thomae

(eds.), Formen seelischen Alterns, Ferdinand Enke Verlag, Stuttgart, 1987.

26.

Fooken

, Überleben im hohen Alter-Ein Vergleich “kurz- and undlanglebiger” Probanden der Bonner Gerontologischen Längsschnittstudie (BOLSA), Zeitschrift für Gerontologie, 17, pp. 340–358, 1984.

27.

Carlsson

Arvidsson

Bygren

L-O.

, and Werkö

, Liv och hälsa, Liber, Stockholm, p. 111, 1982.

28.

Illsley

, Social Class Selection and Class Differences in Relation to Stillbirths and Infant Deaths, British Medical Journal, 2, pp. 1520–1524, 1955.

29.

Stern

, Social Mobility and the Interpretation of Social Class Mortality Differentials, Journal of Social Policy, 12, p. 35, 1983.

30.

SPRI, Rapport 82, Hur mår du Sverige?, SPRI, Stockholm, 1982.

31.

Tibblin

, Om dödlighet och sårbarhet, Social-medicinsk Tidskrift, 9, pp. 67–75, 1981.

32.

Krout

J. A.

, Rural versus Urban Differences in Health Dependence among the Elderly Population, International Journal and Human Development, 28:2, pp. 141–156, 1989.

33.

Macfarlane

and Mugford

, Birth Counts: Statistics of Pregnancy and Childbirth, National Perinatal Epidemiology Unit, HMSO, London, 1984.

34.

d—Abbs

, Social Support Networks, Institute of Family Studies, Monograph no. 1, Melbourne, pp. 25–51, 1992.

35.

Norman

, Från Bergslagen till Nordamerika, Akademisk avhandling, Uppsala universitet, p. 156, 1974.

36.

Swedish Socio-Economic Classification (SEI), Reports on Statistical Coordination, Statistics Sweden, 4, p. 4, 1982.

37.

Lee

L. T.

, Statistical Methods for Survival Data Analyses, LLP, Belmont, pp. 221–223, 1980.

38.

BMDP Statistical Software, 1983 Printing with Additions, University of California Press, London, 1983.

39.

Ferraro

K. F.

, Widowhood and Health, in Aging, Stress and Health, Markides

K. S.

and Cooper

C. L.

(eds.), John Wiley & Sons Ltd., p. 80, 1990.

40.

Biegel

D. E.

, The Application of Network Theory and Research to the Field of Aging, in Social Support Networks and the Care of the Elderly, Sauer

W. J.

Coward

R. T.

(eds.), Springer Publishing Company, New York, p. 253, 1985.

41.

Rosenmayr

, Progress and Unresolved Problems in Socio-Gerontological Theory, Aktuelle Gerontologie, 9, p. 4, 1979.