Abortion Reporting in the United States: An Assessment of Three National Fertility Surveys
We present estimates of abortion underreporting for three of the most commonly used national fertility surveys in the United States: the National Survey of Family Growth, the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997, and the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health. Numbers of abortions reported in each survey were compared with external abortion counts obtained from a census of all U.S. abortion providers, with adjustments for comparable respondent ages and periods of each data source. We examined the influence of survey design factors, including survey mode, sampling frame, and length of recall, on abo...
Source: Demography - May 25, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Understanding Trends in the Concentration of Infant Mortality Among Disadvantaged White and Black Mothers in the United States, 1983 –2013: A Decomposition Analysis
AbstractThe United States compares unfavorably with other high-income countries in infant mortality, which recent literature has attributed to the poor birth outcomes among disadvantaged (i.e., unmarried and less-educated) mothers. Describing and decomposing the trend of the concentration of infant mortality among disadvantaged mothers thus provides important clues for improving birth outcomes. We develop the infant mortality disadvantage index (IMDI) to measure such concentration. Using the 1983 –2013 Birth Cohort Linked Birth and Infant Death data, we show that although the IMDI—as a measure of mortality inequality...
Source: Demography - May 21, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
The Examination of Diffusion Effects on Modern Contraceptive Use in Nigeria
This study uses data gathered for an evaluation of a Bill& Melinda Gates Foundation –funded initiative designed to increase modern contraceptive use in select urban areas of Nigeria. When the initiative was conceived, the hope was that any positive momentum in the cities would diffuse to surrounding areas. Using a variety of statistical methods, we study three aspects of diffusio n and their effects on modern contraceptive use: spread through mass communications, social learning, and social influence. Using a dynamic causal model, we find strong evidence of social multiplier effects through social learning. The resul...
Source: Demography - May 18, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Young Adulthood Relationships in an Era of Uncertainty: A Case for Cohabitation
AbstractThe young adulthood years are demographically dense. Dr. Ronald Rindfuss made this claim when he was Population Association of America (PAA) president in 1991 (Rindfuss1991), and this conclusion holds today. I offer both an update of his work by including Millennials and a new view on young adulthood by focusing on an increasingly common experience: cohabitation. I believe we need to move away from our marriage-centric lens of young adulthood and embrace the complexity that cohabitation offers. The cohabitation boom is continuing with no evidence of a slowdown. Young adults are experiencing complex relationship bio...
Source: Demography - May 18, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Living Arrangements and Supplemental Income Programs for Older Adults in Mexico
AbstractLiving arrangements often reflect important quality-of-life indicators for elderly adults. In particular, increased income can prompt changes in household living arrangements for elderly adults. Using a differences-in-differences approach, we examine whether a supplemental income program in Mexico for adults aged 70 and older influenced household size and composition. We compare outcomes at baseline and at six-month follow-up for elderly adults in the treatment group with those in the control group that did not participate in the program. We find that household size increased by 3% in the treatment group relative t...
Source: Demography - May 18, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Evacuees and Migrants Exhibit Different Migration Systems After the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami
AbstractResearch on the destinations of environmentally induced migrants has found simultaneous migration to both nearby and long-distance destinations, most likely caused by the comingling of evacuee and permanent migrant data. Using a unique data set of separate evacuee and migration destinations, we compare and contrast the pre-, peri-, and post-disaster migration systems of permanent migrants and temporary evacuees of the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami. We construct and compare prefecture-to-prefecture migration matrices for Japanese prefectures to investigate the similarity of migration systems. We find evide...
Source: Demography - May 18, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Son Preference and Fertility Decisions: Evidence From Spatiotemporal Variation in Korea
AbstractUsing Korean data, this study investigates whether son-favoring ideas or the preference for sons affect fertility decisions. Son-favoring fertility behavior in Korea is of interest because the sex ratio at birth has recovered to a natural level after having been very skewed. To isolate the effects of the preference for sons from the effects of the surrounding environment, we compare the fertility behavior of individuals living in the same region but who were born in different regions or years. Exploiting the male-female gap in educational achievement at the parents ’ time and place of birth as exogenous variation...
Source: Demography - May 18, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Live Births and Fertility Amid the Zika Epidemic in Brazil
AbstractIn late 2015, the Brazilian Ministry of Health and the Pan American Health Organization classified the increase in congenital malformations associated with the Zika virus (ZIKV) as a public health emergency. The risk of ZIKV-related congenital syndrome poses a threat to reproductive outcomes that could result in declining numbers of live births and potentially fertility. Using monthly microdata on live births from the Brazilian Information System on Live Births (SINASC), this study examines live births and fertility trends amid the ZIKV epidemic in Brazil. Findings suggest a decline in live births that is stratifie...
Source: Demography - May 11, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
When Did the Health Gradient Emerge? Social Class and Adult Mortality in Southern Sweden, 1813 –2015
AbstractAcross today ’s developed world, there is a clear mortality gradient by socioeconomic status for all ages. It is often taken for granted that this gradient was as strong—or even stronger—in the past when social transfers were rudimentary and health care systems were less developed. Some studies based on cr oss-sectional data have supported this view, but others based on longitudinal data found that this was not the case. If there was no gradient in the past, when did it emerge? To answer this question, we examine social class differences in adult mortality for men and women in southern Sweden over a 2 00-year...
Source: Demography - May 4, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
From Malthusian Disequilibrium to the Post-Malthusian Era: The Evolution of the Preventive and Positive Checks in Germany, 1730 –1870
This study draws on a new data set of vital rates and real wages to explore short-term and long-term behavior of the preventive and positive checks in a major economy of premodern mainland Europe. Four results stand out. First, the preventive check was fairly stable throughout the period 1730 –1870; its magnitude of 0.2 to 0.35 was comparable with that of England, northern and central Italy, and Sweden. Second, the eighteenth century was characterized by Malthusian disequilibrium in that there was no long-term relationship between the crude death rate and the real wage, whereas the cru de death rate’s instantaneous res...
Source: Demography - May 3, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Self-selection of Asylum Seekers: Evidence From Germany
AbstractI examine the pattern of selection on education of asylum seekers recently arrived in Germany from five key source countries: Afghanistan, Albania, Iraq, Serbia, and Syria. The analysis relies on original individual-level data collected in Germany combined with surveys conducted at origin. The results reveal a positive pattern of selection on education for asylum seekers who were able to flee Iraq and Syria, and the selection is neutral for individuals seeking asylum from Afghanistan and negative for asylum seekers from Albania and Serbia. I provide an interpretation of these patterns based on differences in the ex...
Source: Demography - May 3, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
The Long-Term Costs of Family Trajectories: Women ’s Later-Life Employment and Earnings Across Europe
AbstractThe “motherhood earnings penalty” is a well-established finding in many Western countries. However, a divide between mothers and nonmothers might oversimplify reality given that the family life course has diversified over the last decades. In addition, whether family choices have consequences for wo men’s employment and earnings in later life is not well known, particularly in a comparative perspective. Using data on 50- to 59-year-old women from the Generations and Gender Programme, the British Household Panel Survey, and SHARELIFE for 22 European countries, we derive a typology of women’s family trajector...
Source: Demography - April 22, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Double Trouble: The Burden of Child-rearing and Working on Maternal Mortality
AbstractWe document increased old-age mortality rates among Swedish mothers of twins compared with mothers of singletons, using administrative data on mortality for 1990 –2010. We argue that twins are an unplanned shock to fertility in the cohorts of older women considered. Deaths due to lung cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and heart attacks—all of which are associated with stress during the life course—are significantly increased. Stratifying t he sample by education and pension income shows the highest increase in mortality rates among highly educated mothers and those with above-median pension incom...
Source: Demography - April 7, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Skill-Based Contextual Sorting: How Parental Cognition and Residential Mobility Produce Unequal Environments for Children
AbstractHighly skilled parents deploy distinct strategies to cultivate their children ’s development, but little is known about how parental cognitive skills interact with metropolitan opportunity structures and residential mobility to shape a major domain of inequality in children’s lives: the neighborhood. We integrate multiple literatures to develop hypotheses on parental skil l-based sorting by neighborhood socioeconomic status and public school test scores, which we test using an original follow-up of the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey. These data include more than a decade’s worth of residential his...
Source: Demography - March 25, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Multidimensional Mortality Selection: Why Individual Dimensions of Frailty Don ’t Act Like Frailty
AbstractTheoretical models of mortality selection have great utility in explaining otherwise puzzling phenomena. The most famous example may be the Black-White mortality crossover: at old ages, Blacks outlive Whites, presumably because few frail Blacks survive to old ages while some frail Whites do. Yet theoretical models of unidimensional heterogeneity, or frailty, do not speak to the most common empirical situation for mortality researchers: the case in which some important population heterogeneity is observed and some is not. I show that, when one dimension of heterogeneity is observed and another is unobserved, neither...
Source: Demography - March 24, 2020 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
