Understanding infant feeding choice from the Great Depression to the baby boom in the U.S.

Objectives: The objectives of this study were to describe the rates of and factors associated with exclusive breastfeeding (XBR), exclusive breast feeding + breast and bottle-feeding (Ever BR), and of exclusive bottle-feeding (XBOT) from 1925-1964 among mothers of the nurse daughters in the Nurses’ Health Cohort Studies. Methods: The Nurses' Maternal Cohort Study (N= 39,743) is a retrospective cohort of the mothers of the nurse daughters who completed a questionnaire on reproductive characteristics and infant feeding. Multiple logistic regression analysis was used to estimate the adjusted odds ratios for Ever BR and XBR compared to XBOT by birth year and other covariates. Results: Ever BR rates steadily declined from 80% in the Great Depression to 37% in 1964; similarly XBR rates declined from 41% to 10%, respectively. Factors positively associated with Ever BR included: any maternal college education compared to <12 years of education and delivering a low or high compared to normal birth weight nurse daughter. Factors negatively associated with Ever BR were: smoking during pregnancy, C-section delivery, prematurity, birth orders 2+, and nurse daughters born 1940-1964. Factors differed by birth cohort, e.g. maternal education was positively associated with XBR only from 1950-64. Among the XBOT, the majority used canned evaporated milk until 1959 and then switched to commercial infant formula. Conclusions: This study documents declining rates of XBR and factors influencing infant feeding choice from 1925-1964, with results varying by birth cohort that differ from current determinants.Nutritional Science

Changes in Intergenerational Mobility in Britain

This paper compares and contrasts estimates of the extent of intergenerational income mobility over time in Britain. Estimates based on two British birth cohorts show that mobility appears to have fallen in a cross-cohort comparison of people who grew up in the 1960s and 1970s (the 1958 birth cohort) as compared to a cohort who grew up in the 1970s and 1980s (the 1970 birth cohort). The sensitivity of labour market earnings to parental income rises, thereby showing less intergenerational mobility for the more recent cohort. This supports theoretical notions that the widening wage and income distribution that occurred from the late 1970s onwards slowed down the extent of mobility up or down the distribution across generations.

Changes in Intergenerational Mobility in Britain

This paper compares and contrasts estimates of the extent of intergenerational income mobility over time in Britain. Estimates based on two British birth cohorts show that mobility appears to have fallen in a cross-cohort comparison of people who grew up in the 1960s and 1970s (the 1958 birth cohort) as compared to a cohort who grew up in the 1970s and 1980s (the 1970 birth cohort). The sensitivity of labour market earnings to parental income rises, thereby showing less intergenerational mobility for the more recent cohort. This supports theoretical notions that the widening wage and income distribution that occurred from the late 1970s onwards slowed down the extent of mobility up or down the distribution across generations.Intergenerational Mobility, Earnings, Family Income, Education.

Estimating linear birth cohort effects: revisiting the age-happiness profile

This paper provides a simple way of accounting for linear birth cohort effects, together with linear age and calendar time effects. It relies on the discreteness of the data and on the fact that not all individuals are born/interviewed in the same day. This creates an exogenous source of age variation within the same cohort that breaks the linear dependence between the three variables. This method is applied to a happiness equation and shows that, once a linear birth cohort term is included in the regression equation, together with linear age and calendar time terms, the robustly found U-shape profile of happiness in age disappears

First birth trends in developed countries: a cohort analysis

-cohort analysis, first birth

An assessment of the data quality for live births and infant deaths for the 1998-birth cohort, city of São Paulo, using information from SINASC and SIM

In this article we use data from the 1998 birth-cohort from the City of São Paulo for live births and data on deaths from the same birth cohort that took place before the first year of life. Information on live birth came from the Information System of Live Births (SINASC) and on deaths came from the Information System on Mortality (SIM). Our aim was to evaluate two aspects of data quality, which are the percentage of missing information and consistency of the data based on empirical regularities observed in other populations or with the criterion of plausibility. Preference for digits, sex ratios at birth and at death and the Apgar score distribution were examples of quality indicators evaluated in this population. We concluded that information is much more frequently recorded for live births than for infant deaths (except for race/color of the infant) and that the internal consistency of the information can be considered satisfactory for the study population.SINASC; SIM; missing data; consistency checks; data quality; birth-cohort

Determinants of Influenza Mortality Trends: Age-Period-Cohort Analysis of Influenza Mortality in the United States, 1959-2016.

This study examines the roles of age, period, and cohort in influenza mortality trends over the years 1959-2016 in the United States. First, we use Lexis surfaces based on Serfling models to highlight influenza mortality patterns as well as to identify lingering effects of early-life exposure to specific influenza virus subtypes (e.g., H1N1, H3N2). Second, we use age-period-cohort (APC) methods to explore APC linear trends and identify changes in the slope of these trends (contrasts). Our analyses reveal a series of breakpoints where the magnitude and direction of birth cohort trends significantly change, mostly corresponding to years in which important antigenic drifts or shifts took place (i.e., 1947, 1957, 1968, and 1978). Whereas child, youth, and adult influenza mortality appear to be influenced by a combination of cohort- and period-specific factors, reflecting the interaction between the antigenic experience of the population and the evolution of the influenza virus itself, mortality patterns of the elderly appear to be molded by broader cohort factors. The latter would reflect the processes of physiological capital improvement in successive birth cohorts through secular changes in early-life conditions. Antigenic imprinting, cohort morbidity phenotype, and other mechanisms that can generate the observed cohort effects, including the baby boom, are discussed

Child abuse registration, fetal growth, and preterm birth: a population based study

Objectives: To study the relation of intra-uterine growth and gestational age with child protection registration in a 20 year whole population birth cohort. Setting: West Sussex area of England. Study design: Retrospective whole population birth cohort. Outcomes: Child protection registration; individual categories of registration—sexual abuse, physical abuse, emotional abuse, and neglect. Population and participants: 119 771 infants born in West Sussex between January 1983 and December 2001 with complete data including birth weight, gestational age, maternal age, and postcode. Results: In all categories of registration a linear trend was noted such that the lower the birth weight z score the higher the likelihood of child protection registration. Similar trends were noted for gestational age. All these trends were robust to adjustment for maternal age and socioeconomic status. Conclusions: The results of this study suggest that lower levels of fetal growth and shorter gestational duration are associated with increased likelihood of child protection registration in all categories including sexual abuse independent of maternal age or socioeconomic status. This study does not permit comment on whether poor fetal growth or preterm birth predispose to child abuse and neglect or the association arises because they share a common pathway

It’s all a Matter of “Choice”. Understanding society’s expectations of older adult ICT use from a birth cohort\ud perspective

Little research exists that examines older adults and their Information and Communication Technology (ICT) use or society’s expectations of their use. Using an intensive interpretive interactionism case study methodology, this paper examines how older adults ages 65-75 (from the Lucky Few birth cohort) view their own use and how other birth cohorts view the Lucky Few's ICT use

A descriptive analysis of the drinking behaviour of the 1958 cohort at age 33 and the 1970 cohort at age 34

This paper provides a comparison of the drinking patterns of members of the 1958 British Birth Cohort at age 33 in 1991 and members of the 1970 British Birth Cohort at age 34 in 2004. In particular the focus is on the relationships between social class, gender and drinking behaviour and how these may have changed over time. In addition we exploit the detailed information available in the cohort studies about the kinds of alcohol that individuals drink to provide a description of how this varies between the two cohorts born twelve years apart. The paper also provides detailed descriptive analyses of the links between frequency of drinking and the number of units drunk for both cohorts. Results suggest that although the 1970 cohort report drinking more frequently than the 1958 cohort did at a similar age, there is only a modest increase in the average number of units of alcohol consumed per week for women and no increase for men. The paper also highlights some possible problems with data on alcohol consumption collected in the 2000 sweep of NCDS and BCS70 and concludes by making some comparisons between data collected in the cohort studies and data collected in the General Household Survey