The Youthful Effect of Childcare Beyond Grandparenthood

Drawing on the active ageing framework that promotes social engagement throughout the life course and in later life, we study subjective age – how old a person feels – and its association with childcare This study compares 50-85 year olds (in chronological age) who look after grandchildren to those who do not and to people looking after other children (e.g., neighbours). Using data from the German Ageing Survey (DEAS), we carry out cross-sectional analyses on grandparenthood, grandparental childcare, and care to other children. We find that looking after other children has about the same beneficial effect on subjective age as looking after grandchildren in later life. Additionally, we exploit the longitudinal nature of DEAS to examine the association between grandparental childcare and subjective age at 3-year follow-up. The results show an age-specific association between grandparental childcare and subjective age with older grandparents experiencing a “rejuvenating effect” when engaged in grandparental childcare. These findings have wide social- and policy-implications, encouraging intergenerational relationships also outside the family to age well

National Variation in Cognitive Life Cycle Development (Revised 7 November 2013)

Maintaining cognitive functioning through mid- to late-life is relevant for both the individual and societal aim of active ageing and reducing dependence in old age. This paper analyses life-cycle variation in country-level rank ordered cognitive performance over a 40-year period. For the cohort born between 1949 and 1952, we observe standardized mathematical test scores at teen age from the First International Mathematics Study (FIMS) and cognitive test performance at mid-life, based on the SHARE survey. This allows us to compare the relative country ranking in 1964 and the performance in 2004 of the same birth cohort. Our results show that those countries which had the highest scores in math tests taken by 13 years old grade level students are not the same countries that, 40 years later, have the top performing scores in cognitive tests among mid-age adults. This highlights the importance of considering country-level influences on cognitive change over the life cycle, in addition to individual characteristics. Further studies are required to explore the link between specific contextual factors and cognitive functioning before we will be able to formulate relevant policy implications from these results

Does grandparenting pay off? The effect of childcare on grandparents' cognitive functioning

In ageing societies, it is crucial to study the factors that can help maintain good cognitive functioning in later life. Previous studies have shown that having an engaged life (e.g., being employed or involved in social activities) has a positive effect on cognitive performance. In line with this strand of the literature, we consider the provision of grandparental childcare as a way to remain active in later life. Therefore, following the use-it-or-lose-it theoretical framework, we hypothesise that providing childcare on a daily basis can help older adults maintain better cognitive functioning. In particular, we focus on grandmothers, as they are the most engaged in childcare. Contrary to our hypothesis, descriptive evidence from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) suggest that grandmothers who look after their grandchildren daily have lower cognitive scores than grandmothers who provide care less frequently. However, we show that this negative effect of providing childcare is attributable to the background characteristics of the grandparents. Using an instrumental variable approach to address the endogeneity of grandparental childcare, we find that providing childcare as a substantial and positive effect on one of the four cognitive tests we consider, verbal fluency. This positive effect is particularly strong for older grandmothers. For the other tests of cognitive functioning, no statistically significant effect of grandparental childcare is found. These results contribute to the limited evidence on the effects of grandparenting on grandparents outcomes

Smoking, Education and the Ability to Predict Own Survival Probabilities: An Observational Study on US Data

Background: Subjective survival probabilities (SSPs) are a good predictor of mortality, go beyond the aggregate description of survival defined by life tables, and are important for individuals’ decision-making in later life. Despite the well-known mortality differentials by education as well as by characteristics such as smoking, little investigation has focused on SSPs by population sub-groups. Methods: We use data on individuals aged 50-89 from the Health and Retirement Study(HRS) carried out in the USA between 2000 and 2012 (N=23,895). Each respondent was asked to assess the probability to survive to a given target age according to their age at the time of the survey. We assess how individuals’ SSPs and estimated objective survival probabilities (OSPs) vary by education and smoking and calculate, for each respondent, the gap between them. Results: Consistently with real mortality patterns, smokers report the lowest SSPs, both among lower and higher educated people. When comparing SSPs and OSPs we find that, irrespectively of the smoking status, higher educated people are more likely to correctly predict their survival probabilities than their lower educated counterparts. Within both education groups, past smokers better predict their survival probability. Current smokers with low education show the highest probability to overestimate their survival probability. Conclusions: Lower educated people and smokers are aware of their lower life expectancy. Still, they overestimate their survival probabilities more than the higher educated and non-smokers. Our findings emphasize the need for policy makers to disseminate information about the risks of smoking, targeting people with lower education

Influence of Older Generation's Fertility Behaviours on Daughter's Desired Family Size in Bihar, India. VID Working Paper 04/2014

This paper investigates the associations between preferred family size of married women aged 16-34 in rural Bihar (India) and the fertility behaviours of their biological mother and mother-in-law. This information is based on scheduled interviews of 450 pairs of index women (i.e. women central in our analysis) and their mother-in-laws conducted in 2011. Preferred family size is first measured by Coombs scale, allowing us to capture latent desired number of children, and then categorized into three categories (low, medium, and high). Ordered logistic regression is employed to estimated the preferred family size of index women. We find that family size preferences of index woman is not associated with mother's fertility but with mother's education. Mother-in-law's desired number of grandchildren is positively associated with preferred family size of index woman and remains significant even after controlling for relevant socioeconomic characteristics. However, in the case where index woman has higher education than her mother-in-law, her preferred family size gets smaller. This suggests that education may provide women with greater autonomy in their decision making on childbearing

Intergenerational support among migrant families in Europe

Intergenerational support is important throughout the individual life course and a major mechanism of cultural continuity. In this study, we analyse support between older parents and their adult children among international migrant and non-migrant populations in North, Centre and Southern Europe. Data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe are used to compare upward and downward practical support, grandparenting, and frequency of contact among 62,213 parent–child dyads. Findings indicate limited differences in support between migrants and non-migrants as well as between migrants of various origins. However, persistent differences in intergenerational support across Europe along a north–south gradient are found irrespective of migrant status

Becoming a grandparent and its effect on well-being: the role of order of transitions, time, and gender

Objectives Although the majority of older people are grandparents, little is known on whether and how the transition into grandparenthood affects their well-being. Moreover, evidence on whether the order of the transition, the time since grandchild’s birth, and the socio-demographic characteristics of the offspring modify the grandparental well-being is scarce. Taking into account these factors, our study examines the association between becoming a grandparent and subsequent well-being. Methods Our study is based on grandparents aged 50 and over from waves 4-6 of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe. Using longitudinal analyses, we investigate associations between becoming a grandparent and subsequent life satisfaction, positive affect, and depression controlling for demographic and socio-economic factors as well as health and well-being at baseline. Furthermore, we explore the role of modifying factors such as whether the grandchild was first-born, the time since transition, and socio-demographic characteristics of the offspring who became a parent. Results Becoming a grandparent has a positive effect on well-being only among women who became grandmothers for the first time and via their daughters. Moreover, this effect is particularly strong in the proximity of the birth of the grandchild. No effects were found among first-time grandfathers. Having an additional grandchild does not affect well-being of grandparents, regardless of the offspring’s characteristics

Bowling Together: Scientific Collaboration Network of Demographers at European Population Conferences.

Exploiting a unique database of metadata for papers presented at six European Population Conferences (EPC) for the years 2006-2016, this paper explores: 1) development of research in population studies; 2) trends and patterns of scientific collaboration networks among demographers; and 3) gender differences in demographic research. The data are organised in a panel format whereby each author, institution and country are linked across the six conferences. We find that collaboration among demographers has increased substantially over the past ten years. While there is no gender disparity in the likelihood of co-authoring a paper, men are significantly more likely than women to collaborate with authors from other institutions. Likewise, the fields of research vary considerably by gender where women are particularly over represented in the subfield ‘fertility and family’ whereas men dominate the subfield ‘data and methods’. Compared to other subfields, research on ‘data and methods’ is more likely to involve collaboration across multiple institutions. With respect to collaboration patterns at the institutional level, a chord diagram plot shows that scientific collaborations across institutions are more common between institutions sharing geographical proximity. Finally, using network centrality measures, we identify key demographic research institutes which play a role in driving demographic research in Europe

Does Grandparenting Influence Engagement in Social Activities?

The positive effects of participation in social activities have been studied in various fields, including political science (in relation to democracy and trust), gerontology, and sociology (for its effects on physical and mental health). Against a background of rapid population ageing, the study of social integration among the elderly is of particular relevance within the framework of active ageing. Yet, whether the relationship between kin and non-kin social activities is characterized by cumulation or competition remains under-explored. In particular, grandparenting has taken a central role for the elderly due to unprecedented overlap between grandparents' and their grandchildren's lives. Grandparenting may stimulate social participation or it may impose time and energy constraints on it. This study aims to assess the effect on the participation in social activities among the elderly of providing childcare on a regular basis. Using an instrumental variable approach on data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe, we find that regular provision of childcare has a significant negative effect on the number of activities in which grandmothers participate. When considering the activities separately by type, we find a negative effect on engagement in educational or training courses for both grandfathers and grandmothers, while a negative effect on volunteering and participating in political or community-related organization is additionally found only for grandmothers. These results contribute to the debate on active ageing

Is Population Ageing Decelerating in Terms of Cognition?

Higher chronological age tends to be associated with lower cognitive functioning in all cohorts. However, in light of increasing healthy life expectancy, people of a certain age today may perform better in terms of cognition than people of the same age in the past. To test this contention, we use tests of cognitive functioning collected in the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) and the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) in two points in time with a 6-year interval. Focusing on the population aged 50 and above, we investigate change over time in cognitive functioning along three dimensions (memory, verbal fluency, and speed of processing). Results based on a repeat cross-sectional design that overcomes potential bias from retest effects suggest that cognitive functioning has improved across survey waves on all of these dimensions. This indicates an extension of significant Flynn effects (which have mainly been studied in children, adolescents, and young adults) to older populations. We find significant secular improvements in cognitive functioning for both women and men, across age groups and educational strata. Several explanations are proposed that go beyond the role of education as the initial driver of the cohort cognitive improvements