State of birth and cardiovascular disease mortality: Multilevel analyses of the National Longitudinal Mortality Study

Unequal before death: The effect of paternal education on children's old-age mortality in the United States

A growing body of research documents the relevance of parental education as a marker of family socio-economic status for children's later-life health outcomes. A strand of this literature evaluates how the early-life environment shapes mortality outcomes during infancy and childhood. However, the evidence on mortality during the life course and old age is limited. This paper contributes to the literature by analysing the association between paternal education and children's old-age mortality. We use data from Social Security Administration death records over the years 1988-2005 linked to the United States 1940 Census. Applying a family(cousin)- fixed-effects model to account for shared environment, childhood exposures, and common endowments that may confound the long-term links, we find that having a father with a college or high-school education, compared with elementary/no education, is associated with a 4.6- or 2.6-month-higher age at death, respectively, for the child, conditional on them surviving to age 47.

Variation in Adult Cognition Across Domains and Life Course Place Effects in the UK

This study explores the role that place of birth and place of residence have in variation in cognition in adulthood in the UK. We take advantage of both the large sample size and number of cognitive domains in the UK Biobank to estimate the effect of place of birth and place of residence on adulthood cognition using multilevel modeling. We find, consistent with studies in the US, that place effects at both time points contribute modest variation (<3% of the variation) across all measured cognitive domains, suggesting a relative lack of contribution of shared environments in explaining future Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias. Moreover, the geographical contribution to cognitive function in adulthood was slightly larger for females than for males. This study is among the first to explore the impact of both the independent and joint associations of place of birth and place of residence with different cognitive domains.

A Review on Electroactive Polymer-Metal Composites: Development and Applications for Tissue Regeneration

Electroactive polymer-metal composites (EAPMCs) have gained significant attention in tissue engineering owing to their exceptional mechanical and electrical properties. EAPMCs develop by combining an electroactive polymer matrix and a conductive metal. The design considerations include choosing an appropriate metal that provides mechanical strength and electrical conductivity and selecting an electroactive polymer that displays biocompatibility and electrical responsiveness. Interface engineering and surface modification techniques are also crucial for enhancing the adhesion and biocompatibility of composites. The potential of EAPMC-based tissue engineering revolves around its ability to promote cellular responses, such as cell adhesion, proliferation, and differentiation, through electrical stimulation. The electrical properties of these composites can be used to mimic natural electrical signals within tissues and organs, thereby aiding tissue regeneration. Furthermore, the mechanical characteristics of the metallic components provide structural reinforcement and can be modified to align with the distinct demands of various tissues. EAPMCs have extraordinary potential as regenerative biomaterials owing to their ability to promote beneficial effects in numerous electrically responsive cells. This study emphasizes the characteristics and applications of EAPMCs in tissue engineering.

Geographic Patterns of Dementia in the United States: Variation by Place of Residence, Place of Birth, and Subpopulation

OBJECTIVES

The prevalence of dementia varies geographically in the United States. However, the extent to which this variation reflects contemporary place-based experiences versus embodied exposures from earlier in the life course remains unclear, and little is known regarding the intersection of place and subpopulation. This study, therefore, evaluates whether and how risk for assessed dementia varies by place of residence and birth, overall and by race/ethnicity and education.

METHODS

We pool data from the 2000 to 2016 waves of the Health and Retirement Study, a nationally representative panel survey of older U.S. adults (n = 96,848 observations). We estimate the standardized prevalence of dementia by Census division of residence and birth. We then fit logistic regression models of dementia on region of residence and birth, adjusting for sociodemographic characteristics, and examine interactions between region and subpopulation.

RESULTS

The standardized prevalence of dementia ranges from 7.1% to 13.6% by division of residence and from 6.6% to 14.7% by division of birth, with rates highest throughout the South and lowest in the Northeast and Midwest. In models accounting for region of residence, region of birth, and sociodemographic covariates, Southern birth remains significantly associated with dementia. Adverse relationships between Southern residence or birth and dementia are generally largest for Black and less-educated older adults. As a result, sociodemographic disparities in predicted probabilities of dementia are largest for those residing or born in the South.

DISCUSSION

The sociospatial patterning of dementia suggests its development is a lifelong process involving cumulated and heterogeneous lived experiences embedded in place.

Social insurance programs and later-life mortality: Evidence from new deal relief spending

A growing body of research explores the long-run effects of social programs and welfare spending. However, evidence linking welfare support in early life with longevity is limited. We add to this literature by evaluating the effect of in-utero and early-life exposure to the largest increases in welfare spending in the US history under the New Deal programs. Using Social Security Administration death records linked with the 1940-census and spending data for 115 major cities, we show that the spending is correlated with improvements in old-age longevity. A treatment-on-treated calculation focused on a period when spending rose by approximately 1900 percent finds that a 100 percent rise in municipal spending in the year of birth is associated with roughly 3.5 months higher longevity. We show that these effects are not driven by endogenous selection of births, selective fertility, endogenous migration, and sample selection caused by endogenous data linking. Additional analysis suggests that rises in education and socioeconomic status are likely channels of impact.

Education in the Jim Crow South and Black-White inequities in allostatic load among older adults

In the U.S., Black adults consistently have higher allostatic load – an indicator of physiological dysregulation – than White adults. Education is considered a likely mechanism given racial differences in attainment, but evidence is mixed. This may be due, in part, to data limitations that have made it difficult for scholars to account for the structurally rooted systemic racism that shaped the U.S. education system and led to large racial inequities in school term length and school attendance among older adults who grew up in the Jim Crow South. Our study addresses this limitation by linking historical data on Black and White segregated school systems in the U.S. South from 1919 to 1954 to the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) to determine if a new measure of educational attainment that accounts for structural racism that led to differences in the number of school days attended by Black and White students across years and states better explains Black-White inequities in allostatic load among older adults who attended school during Jim Crow. We restrict our sample to HRS respondents racialized as White or Black, who resided in the South when they were school-aged, completed primary/secondary school between 1919 and 1954, and provided a measure of allostatic load (n = 1932). We find that our new measure of schooling – duration in school – reduced the Black-White inequity in allostatic load more so than self-reported years of schooling whether we measured allostatic load continuously (34% vs 16%) or categorically (45% vs 20%). Our findings highlight the importance of identifying and using historically informed measures of schooling that account for structurally rooted systemic racism when trying to understand how education shapes the health of individuals racialized as Black in the United States.

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U.S. Black adults show greater physiological dysregulation than White adults.

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Mixed evidence as to whether education explains this inequity.

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May be due to unmeasured structurally rooted systematic racism in early schooling.

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Our education measure accounts for race inequity in term length and days attended.

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This measure explains Black-White inequity in allostatic load.