Work-family life courses and markers of stress and inflammation in mid-life: evidence from the National Child Development Study

Associations of parity and cognitive decline, depression, and chronic comorbidity in West China: Results from WCHAT study

OBJECTIVE

To investigate the associations between parity (the number of offspring a female has borne) and cognitive function, depression, and chronic comorbidity in Western China.

METHODS

A total of 846 women aged 50-55 years were included in the current analysis. Cognitive status was measured using a 10-item short portable mental status questionnaire (SPMSQ). Depressive symptoms were assessed using the 15-item geriatric depression scale (GDS-15). Other characteristics were self-reported. The associations between parity and cognitive decline, depression, and chronic comorbidity were analyzed using univariable and multivariable models. Multivariable models were adjusted for age, ethnic group, occupation, marital status, educational level, lifestyle factors, and sleeping time.

RESULTS

Among the enrolled women, 26.71% were either childless or had one child, 47.40% had two children, 18.32% had three children, and 7.57% had ≥4 children. Compared to women with low parity, women with two or more children exhibited a higher risk of cognitive decline. Moreover, having four or more children was significantly associated with depression and chronic comorbidity. After adjusting covariates, women with three or more children exhibited a higher risk of cognitive decline than those with low parity. However, high parity was not significantly associated with depression or chronic comorbidity after adjustment for covariates.

CONCLUSION

Our study showed that ≥3 children was associated with cognitive decline in women. Longitudinal studies are needed to evaluate this conclusion and to investigate the mechanisms involved. More importantly, families and societies should pay more attention to women's long-term health outcomes related to fertility.

The Potential for Prevention Science in Middle and Late Adulthood: a Commentary on the Special Issue of Prevention Science

This commentary on the special issue of Prevention Science, "Toward a Lifespan Prevention Science: A Focus on Middle and Late Adulthood" reviews the studies included in the issue, compares findings, and makes recommendations for future directions in this emerging field. Articles in this issue addressed a number of the key elements of prevention science, including identifying proximal and distal risk and protective factors that play a role in middle and late adult health and well-being, providing preliminary evidence for a preventive intervention to moderate stress reactivity, and proposing a theoretical approach to preventing substance misuse across the lifespan. Our commentary centers around three critical areas for mid and later life prevention science: the importance of theory building, a focus on alcohol and its role in midlife health, and health disparities. Each of the articles in this issue touched on at least one of these areas. We conclude that a focus on prevention in mid and later life has strong potential, and further research is needed.

Work-family trajectories in young adulthood: Associations with mental health problems in adolescence

During young adulthood, several transitions in work and family lives occur, but knowledge of the work-family trajectories of the current generation of young adults, i.e. people born in the 1990s, is lacking. Moreover, little is known about whether the mental health status before the start of the working life may shape work-family trajectories. We used 18-year follow-up data from the TRAILS cohort study of individuals born between 1989 and 1991 (n = 992; 63.2% women). Internalising and externalising problems were measured with the Youth Self-Report at ages 11, 13 and 16 years. Monthly employment, education and parenthood states were recorded between 18 and 28 years. Applying sequence analysis, we identified six work-family trajectories in women and men. The first five trajectories were labelled: long education, continuous education and work, education and work to work, early work, and inactive. The main difference between trajectories of women and men was in the timing of parenthood, thus the remaining trajectory of women was labelled active with children, and the remaining trajectory of men active. Women who experienced externalising problems in adolescence were more likely to belong to the trajectory characterised by parenthood. Men who experienced internalising problems in adolescence were more likely to belong to the trajectory characterised by a long time spent in education. The TRAILS data allowed us to consider timing, duration and ordering of the work and family states in young adulthood, and to use multiple assessments of mental health in adolescence. Further research needs to examine the mechanisms through which early mental health affects later work and family outcomes.

Gendered work-family life courses and late-life physical functioning: A comparative analysis from 28 European countries

Combining work and family roles can have beneficial consequences on health but could also result in chronic stress and adverse health outcomes at older ages. This study aimed to examine combined employment, parenthood, and partnership histories of men and women during the childbearing period (ages 15-49), and to investigate the links of these work and family roles with physical functioning later in life. We used data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) with retrospective information on employment, parenthood, and partnership histories for 18,057 men and 20,072 women (n = 38,129) living in 28 different countries belonging to six European welfare clusters. We applied multichannel sequence analysis (MCSQA) and hierarchical clustering to group work-family trajectories into 12 clusters for men and 15 clusters for women. We assessed the association between work-family life courses and grip strength by estimating multivariable linear regression models. Delayed work and family transitions, unstable employment, and the absence of combinations of work and family roles between age 15 and 49 were associated with weaker grip strength in later life for both men and women. Results differed by gender and were framed by the welfare context in which gendered work and family responsibilities unfold across individual life courses. The findings make an important contribution to the domain of gender and health in later life and stress the need to engage more with issues related to the mechanisms linking work and family trajectories to poor health in later life.

Work-family trajectories and health: A systematic review

BACKGROUND

Work and family lives interact in complex ways across individuals' life courses. In the past decade, many studies constructed work-family trajectories, some also examined the relation with health. The aims of this systematic review were to summarise the evidence from studies constructing work-family trajectories, and to synthesise the evidence on the association between work-family trajectories and health.

METHODS

We searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, PsycINFO, SocINDEX and Web of Science databases. Key search terms related to work, family and trajectories. Studies that built combined work-family trajectories or examined the relationship between work and family trajectories were included. Risk of bias was assessed independently by two authors. The identified work-family trajectories were summarised and presented for men and women, age cohorts and contexts. The evidence on the association with health as antecedent or consequence was synthesised.

RESULTS

Forty-eight studies, based on 29 unique data sources, were included. Thirty-two studies (67%) were published in 2015 or later, and sequence analysis was the primary analytic technique used to construct the trajectories (n = 43, 90%). Trajectories of women were found to be more diverse and complex in comparison with men. Work-family trajectories differed by age cohorts and contexts. Twenty-three studies (48%) examined the association between work-family trajectories and health and most of these studies found significant associations. The results indicate that work-family trajectories characterised by an early transition to parenthood, single parenthood, and weak ties to employment are associated with worse health outcomes.

CONCLUSIONS

Work-family trajectories differed greatly between men and women, but differences seemed to decrease in the youngest cohorts. Given the current changes in labour markets and family formation processes, it is important to investigate the work and family lives of younger cohorts. Work-family trajectories were associated with health at different life stages. Future research should examine longitudinal associations of work-family trajectories with health and focus on elucidating why and under which circumstances some trajectories are associated with better or worse health compared with other trajectories.

Employment Pathways during Economic Recession and Recovery and Adult Health

Our study bridges literatures on the health effects of job loss and life course employment trajectories to evaluate the selection into employment pathways and their associations with health in the short and medium terms. We apply sequence analysis to monthly employment calendars from a population-based sample of working-age women and men observed from 2009 to 2013 (N = 737). We identify six distinct employment status clusters: stable full-time employment, stable part-time employment, stably being out of the labor force, long-term unemployment, transition out of the labor force, and unstable full-time employment. After adjustment for sociodemographic characteristics and health at baseline, those who transitioned out of the labor force showed significantly poorer self-rated health at follow-up, whereas steadily part-time employed respondents still showed a greater risk of meeting criteria for major or minor depression. The findings have important implications for how social scientists conceptualize and model the relationship between employment status and health.

Multiple social roles in early adulthood and later mental health in different labour market contexts

Work and family roles entail divergent responsibilities, which can be a source of conflict especially in young adulthood - the so-called "rush-hour" of life. Combining these multiple social roles can result in an accumulation of stress but also be a valuable resource for mental health. The aim of this study is to investigate combined employment, parenthood and partnership trajectories of men and women during early adulthood, and to analyse the relationship of these multiple roles with depressive symptoms at older age. We used harmonised data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) and the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) with retrospective information on employment, partnerships and parenthood histories between age 25 and 40 for 18,816 men and 24,686 women (n = 43,502). We applied sequence analysis and clustering to group trajectories into four clusters for women and three clusters for men. We then used multilevel models to analyse the links between combined employment and family roles and later mental health in different historical labour market contexts (indicated by female employment rates). Women and men who did not combine work and family roles between age 25 and 40 report higher levels of depression than those who combined work and family. Results differ by gender and labour market context, with stronger differences between women in countries with higher female employment rates. Overall, combining multiple roles in early adulthood is associated with decreased rather than increased risk for depressive symptoms in older Europeans.

Work-family life courses and psychological distress: Evidence from three British birth cohort studies

This study uses multi-channel sequence analysis to characterize work-family life course types between the ages of 16 and 42, and multivariable logistic regression to examine their association with psychological distress at age 42/43 for men and women in three nationally-representative British birth cohorts born in 1946 (N = 2,858), 1958 (N = 9,140), and 1970 (N = 7,095). We hypothesised that work-family life courses characterized by weaker links to employment and earlier transitions to partnerships and parenthood would be associated with a greater probability of psychological distress at age 42, and that this association would be become more pronounced across cohorts. Levels of psychological distress were higher amongst men and women with weaker long-term ties to employment, although these were largely explained by early life factors. Teen mothers had higher levels of psychological distress in the two later-born cohorts, and this remained unexplained in adjusted models for the 1970 cohort.

The Long Shadow of Youth: Girls' Transition From Full-Time Education and Later-Life Subjective Well-Being in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing

OBJECTIVES

To investigate whether the timing and nature of women's transitions out of full-time (FT) education are related to later-life subjective well-being and the life-course experiences that might explain any associations seen.

METHODS

Data are from women in Wave 3 of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing who have participated in the life history interview and were aged 50+ at the interview (n = 3,889). Using multichannel sequence analysis, we identified 6 types of transition out of FT education (ages 14-26). Regression models were used to examine associations between transition types and life satisfaction, quality of life, and depressive symptoms at age 50+.

RESULTS

Women who made early transitions to married parenthood and FT domestic labor had lower levels of well-being on all 3 later-life well-being outcomes (p < .01), compared to women who made later transitions to family life and remained employed. Women who remained single up to age 26 also had lower life satisfaction (p < .05) and quality of life (p < .01) in later life than their counterparts who married and had children. These associations were explained by the life-course socioeconomic and relationship pathways. Advantaged childhood socioeconomic circumstances and higher educational qualifications set "Later Marriage and Later employment" women apart onto advantaged trajectories and a better quality of life later (p < .01).

DISCUSSION

The timing and nature of exits from FT education played a pivotal role in setting people onto life-course trajectories that influence well-being in later life for this older generation of women.

Adverse employment histories and allostatic load: associations over the working life

Background

Most studies on the health impact of occupational stress use single-point measures of stress at work. This study analyses the associations of properties of entire employment trajectories over an extended time period with a composite score of allostatic load (AL).

Methods

Data come from the French CONSTANCES cohort, with information on adverse employment histories between ages 25 and 45 and a composite score of AL (based on 10 biomarkers, range 0–10) among people aged 45 or older (47 680 women and 45 035 men). Data were collected by questionnaires (including retrospective employment histories) or by health examinations (including blood-based biomarkers). We distinguish six career characteristics: number of temporary jobs, number of job changes, number of unemployment periods, years out of work, mode occupational position and lack of job promotion.

Results

For both men and women, results of negative binomial regressions indicate that adverse employment histories are related to higher levels of AL, particularly histories that are characterised by a continued disadvantaged occupational position, repeated periods of unemployment or years out of work. Findings are adjusted for partnership, age and education, and respondents with a health-related career interruption or early retirement are excluded.

Conclusions

Our study highlights physiological responses as a mechanism through which chronic stress during working life is linked to poor health and calls for intervention efforts among more disadvantaged groups at early stages of labour market participation.

Joint Family and Work Trajectories and Multidimensional Wellbeing

Informed by the life course perspective, this paper investigates whether and how employment and family trajectories are jointly associated with subjective, relational and financial wellbeing later in life. We draw on data from the Swiss Household Panel which combines biographical retrospective information on work, partnership and childbearing trajectories with 19 annual waves containing a number of wellbeing indicators as well as detailed socio-demographic and social origin information. We use sequence analysis to identify the main family and work trajectories for men and women aged 20–50 years old. We use OLS regression models to assess the association between those trajectories and their interdependency with wellbeing. Results reveal a joint association between work and family trajectories and wellbeing at older age, even net of social origin and pre-trajectory resources. For women, but not for men, the association is also not fully explained by proximate (current family and work status) determinants of wellbeing. Women’s stable full-time employment combined with traditional family trajectories yields a subjective wellbeing premium, whereas childlessness and absence of a stable partnership over the life course is associated with lower levels of financial and subjective wellbeing after 50 especially in combination with a trajectory of weak labour market involvement. Relational wellbeing is not associated with employment trajectories, and only weakly linked to family trajectories among men.

Adverse Employment Histories, Later Health Functioning and National Labor Market Policies: European Findings Based on Life-History Data From SHARE and ELSA

OBJECTIVES

We investigate associations between adverse employment histories over an extended time period and health functioning in later life, and explore whether national labor market policies moderate the association.

METHODS

We use harmonized life-history data from the Gateway to Global Aging Data on two European studies (SHARE and ELSA) linked to health beyond age 50 (men = 11,621; women = 10,999). Adverse employment histories consist of precarious, discontinued, and disadvantaged careers between age 25 and 50, and we use depressive symptoms, grip strength, and verbal memory as outcomes.

RESULTS

Adverse employment histories between age 25 and 50 are associated with poor health functioning later in life, particularly repeated periods of unemployment, involuntary job losses, weak labor market ties, and disadvantaged occupational positions. Associations remain consistent after adjusting for age, partnership history, education and employment situation, and after excluding those with poor health prior to or during working life. We find no variations of the associations by national labor market policies.

DISCUSSION

Our study calls for increased intervention efforts to improve working conditions at early career stages. Despite the importance in shaping employment histories, the role of national policies in modifying the impact of employment on health is less clear.

Lifetime employment, tobacco use, and alcohol consumption trajectories and cardiovascular diseases in old age

Despite the great advances of life course epidemiology studies during the last decade in understanding the general health effects of employment trajectories, research has yet to evaluate the effects of employment trajectories along with other major risk factors, such as tobacco and alcohol consumption, on cardiovascular diseases (CVDs)-the main cause of deaths worldwide. This is highly relevant, since health advantages in one domain (e.g., being a permanent formal full-time worker) may offset health disadvantages in other domains (e.g., being a regular smoker or alcohol consumer); conversely, disadvantages in both domains may interact, leading to even greater health risks. Considering these knowledge gaps, this research has two main objectives: (1) to reconstruct simultaneous employment, tobacco use, and alcohol consumption trajectories over the life course (from birth to old age) and (2) to measure the association between these trajectories and CVD in old age. Drawing on a rich and comprehensive life history dataset and using multichannel sequence and regression analyses, we analyzed a cohort of individuals aged 65-75 in Chile, a Latin American country with high social inequalities and scarce research on this matter. Our study shows that following a trajectory of formal employment together with no tobacco and alcohol use reduces CVD risk by 36 percentage points relative to a similar employment trajectory but with regular tobacco and alcohol use. Even with an employment trajectory characterized by constant informal employment or permanent inactivity, a life course free of regular tobacco and alcohol use shows protective effects against CVD. This study stresses the importance of health policies that consider CVD as a condition that strongly depends on individual experiences in multiple life domains and across different life stages.

Work-Family Conflict and Work Exit in Later Career Stage

Objectives

This study investigated relationships between work–family conflict and routes of later-life work exit.

Methods

We used a cohort of British civil servants (5,157 men; 2,027 women) who participated in the Whitehall II study. Work interference with family (WIF) and family interference with work (FIW) were measured up to three times over 10 years. Cause-specific Cox models were used to assess the influence of WIF/FIW on particular routes (“retirement,” “health-related exit,” “unemployment,” or “homemaker/other”) of work exit in later career stage and all routes combined.

Results

WIF was not associated with any route of work exit in men or women, after adjusting for confounders. For perceived higher FIW, men were less likely to exit work through retirement, homemaker/other, or all routes combined. This was not attenuated by adding family factors or working conditions. Women with higher FIW were more likely to exit through the homemaker route. This was no longer significant after adjusting for family factors. Neither FIW nor WIF was associated with health-related exit or unemployment.

Discussion

FIW makes women more likely to become a homemaker at later career stage but reduces the risk of leaving work for men, which may reinforce gender inequality in work participation.

Work–family lifecourses and later-life health in the United Kingdom

Socio-economic inequalities in physical and mental health persist at older ages and previous studies have shown that partnership and parenthood histories are also associated with differentials in later-life health. These domains of adult life interact, and both may be influenced by earlier life circumstances, indicating a need for a holistic approach to understanding lifecourse influences on health at older ages. In this paper, we identify classes of lifecourse types for a United Kingdom (UK) cohort born 1933–1945 and investigate differences between the latent classes identified in physical and mental health, and changes in health over a five-year follow-up period. Data were drawn from Waves 1–5 (2009–2013) of the nationally representative UK Household Longitudinal Study. Multi-level models were used to analyse associations with summary indicators of physical and mental health measured using the SF-12, and changes in health, controlling for childhood circumstances and taking account of support from family and friends in later life. Lifecourses characterised by lower socio-economic position, early parenthood and large family size were associated with worse physical and mental health in later life, with respondents who had combined a high socio-economic position and two children being the most advantaged. The study indicates that socio-economic disparities in later-life health vary depending on the way in which individuals combine work and family life.

Finding Jobs, Forming Families, and Stressing Out? Work, Family, and Stress among Young Adult Women in the United States

The transition to adulthood is increasingly characterized by complex paths into the world of work and family, especially for young women. Yet how work and family combine to influence stress among young adult women is not well understood. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health, we leverage new extensions to latent class analysis (LCA) to identify common combinations of work and family circumstances among young adult women, their earlier life and contemporaneous correlates, and associations with two stress measures: a multi-item Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) and Epstein–Barr Viral (EBV) antibody titers, a well-validated biomarker of stress-related immunity impairments. We identify seven different common combinations of latent work–family combinations among young adult women ranging from well-compensated professional workers with and without children, mothers without paid employment, and delayed transitions to work and family. Completing a college degree was associated with a higher likelihood of membership in classes marked by professional work irrespective of motherhood, while being raised in a community with greater female labor opportunities was generally associated with membership in child-free classes. Mothers and child-free women in “pink-collar” work with low wages and decision-marking freedom reported higher stress compared to women in “white-collar” work with higher wages and decision-making freedom. These differences are mostly attenuated following adjustments for poverty-related stressors and work–family conflict. While prior work has emphasized the health benefits for women of combining work and family, our research suggests these benefits may be limited to women of higher socioeconomic status with flexible, well-compensated jobs.

Gendered work-family trajectories and depression at older age

Objectives: The paper identifies types of work-family trajectories of men and women and investigates their links with depression at older age. Method: We use data from the Heinz Nixdorf Recall study, with retrospective information on employment histories and parenthood between age 20 and 50 (1482 men and 1537 women, born between 1925 and 1955). We apply sequence analysis and group trajectories into six clusters for each gender. We test their association with two alternative measures of depression: self-reported depressive symptoms and intake of antidepressant medication. Multivariate models exclude participants with early life depression and adjust for age, marital status, education, and income. Results: We find clear differences of work-family trajectories between men and women, where women's trajectories are generally more diverse, and include family leaves and returns into full or part-time work. For men, work-family trajectories are neither related to depressive symptoms nor to medication intake. In contrast, women who returned into full-time work after family leave show more depression than those who return part-time, both in terms of depressive symptoms and intake of antidepressant medication. Conclusion: Our findings show gender differences in terms of work-family trajectories and their health-related consequences. In particular, findings suggest that mothers who return to full-time work are a vulnerable group for depression at older age and should be the focus of further research attention.

Fertility histories and chronic conditions later in life in Europe

Understanding the association between fertility histories and health later in life is necessary in the context of ageing societies. Past literature has generally found a U-shaped relationship between parity, age at first birth, and several health-related outcomes. However, these findings differed to some extent depending on the country under analysis and on the measures of health considered. As such, using wave 3 (2008-2009) and 5 (2013) of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), this work aimed to answer the question: "Are fertility histories associated with the presence of chronic conditions later in life in Europe?" The analysis included 11 European countries and compared results using two different measures of chronic conditions: self-reported chronic or long-term illness and chronic diseases diagnosed by a doctor. Results showed that age at first birth is more relevant than parity for health outcomes at older ages. Moreover, in socio-democratic and continental countries, the association between fertility and chronic conditions-in particular between age at first birth and long-term illnesses-is statistically significant among women, but not among men. Finally, the association between fertility history and health was similar when using self-reported measures and chronic diseases diagnosed by a doctor.

Adverse employment histories and health functioning: the CONSTANCES study

BACKGROUND

With changing employment histories in European labour markets, occupational health research needs to be supplemented by an approach that integrates adverse characteristics of entire employment histories, in terms of precarious, discontinued and disadvantaged employment careers. We analyse associations of adverse employment histories and six measures of health functioning, including affective, physical and cognitive functioning.

METHODS

We use baseline data from the CONSTANCES study with detailed retrospective data on previous employment histories that are linked to current health functioning among people aged 45-60 years (men = 15 134; women = 16 584). The following career characteristics are assessed (all referring to careers between ages 25 and 45 years): number of jobs with temporary contracts, number of job changes, number of unemployment periods, years out of work, mode occupational position and lack of job promotion. The measures of health functioning range from depressive symptoms, standing balance, walking speed, lung function, to verbal memory and semantic fluency.

RESULTS

For both men and women, multilevel regressions (participant nested in health-examination centre) revealed that adverse employment histories are associated with poor health functioning later on, in particular persistent disadvantage in terms of low occupational position, repeated periods of unemployment and weak labour-market ties (years out of work). Findings remain consistent after excluding respondents who had a health-related career interruption or already retired before age 45 years and, additionally, after adjusting for age, partnership and education.

CONCLUSION

Findings call for increased intervention efforts among more disadvantaged groups of the labour market at early-career stages.

Social sequencing to determine patterns in health and work-family trajectories for U.S. women, 1968-2013

BACKGROUND

Women's social roles (partnership, parenthood, and worker status) are associated with health, with more roles being associated with lower mortality rates. Few studies have examined social roles using a lifecourse perspective to understand how changing role dynamics affect health over time. Sequence analysis is one analytic technique for examining social trajectories.

METHODS

Work-family trajectories were determined using social sequence analysis. We estimated mortality using age-standardized mortality rates and Poisson regression and examined the impact of personal income as a mediator.

RESULTS

We identified 5 trajectory types according to probability distributions of work/marriage/child-rearing status and descriptions in previous research: Non-working, married, later-mothers; working divorced mothers; working and non-working, never-married mothers; working, never-married non-mothers; and non-working, married earlier-mothers. Our reference group, non-working, married, later-mothers had the lowest mortality rates (1.47 per 1000 person-years). Adjusting for confounders, timing of childbearing did not impact mortality rates for married, non-working women. Working, never-married non-mothers and working and non-working, never-married mothers had the highest adjusted rates of mortality (RR = 1.81 and 1.57, respectively) these effects were attenuated slightly by the addition of household income in the model. Mortality rates for other trajectory groups were not significantly elevated in adjusted models.

CONCLUSIONS

Mortality rates vary by work-family trajectories, but timing of childbearing does not meaningfully impact risk among women in this population, likely because few of the women who were married and had children also worked full-time. Household income has some mediating effect among those at highest risk of early mortality.

A Longitudinal Study of Allostatic Load in Later Life: The Role of Sex, Birth Cohorts, and Risk Accumulation

Are challenging life courses associated with more wear and tear on the biological level? This study investigates this question from a life-course perspective by examining the influence of life-course risk accumulation on allostatic load (AL), considering the role of sex and birth cohorts. Using biomarker data collected over three waves (2004, 2008, and 2012) of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing ( N = 3,824) in a growth curve framework, AL trajectories over a period of 8 years are investigated. Our results illustrate that AL increases substantially in later life. Men have higher AL than women, but increases are similar for both sexes. Older cohorts have both higher levels and a steeper increase of AL over time. Higher risk accumulation over the life course goes hand in hand with higher AL levels and steeper trajectories, contributing to the body of evidence on cumulative (dis)advantage processes in later life.

Previsão do Índice de Desenvolvimento Humano e da expectativa de vida nos países da América Latina por meio de técnicas de mineração de dados

Resumo A previsibilidade de indicadores epidemiológicos pode contribuir na projeção de variáveis dependentes, auxiliar em tomadas de decisões para sustentar ou não políticas públicas e justificar o cenário vivido pelos países e o mundo. O artigo tem por objetivo predizer o Índice de Desenvolvimento Humano e a expectativa de vida nos países latino-americanos no período de 2015 a 2020, utilizando técnicas de mineração de dados. Foram percorridas as etapas do processo Descoberta de Conhecimento em Base Dados. Adotaram-se para previsões modelos desenvolvidos com séries multivariadas através do algoritmo de mineração de dados SMOReg, que apresentaram melhor desempenho em testes desenvolvidos durante o experimento. As médias do Índice de Desenvolvimento Humano e da expectativa de vida nos países latino-americanos tendem a aumentar no período analisado, respectivamente, 4,99 ± 3,90 % e 2,65 ± 0,06 anos. Experiências multivariadas possibilitam maior aprendizagem dos algoritmos, aumentando sua precisão. As técnicas de mineração de dados apresentaram melhor qualidade nas previsões em relação à técnica mais popular, ARIMA. As previsões sugerem média de crescimento do IDH e EV dos países latino-americanos maiores que a mundial.

Do work and family care histories predict health in older women?

Background

Social and policy changes in the last several decades have increased women’s options for combining paid work with family care. We explored whether specific combinations of work and family care over the lifecourse are associated with variations in women’s later life health.

Methods

We used sequence analysis to group women in the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing according to their work histories and fertility. Using logistic regression, we tested for group differences in later life disability, depressive symptomology and mortality, while controlling for childhood health and socioeconomic position and a range of adult socio-economic circumstances and health behaviours.

Results

Women who transitioned from family care to either part-time work after a short break from the labour force, or to full-time work, reported lower odds of having a disability compared with the reference group of women with children who were mostly employed full-time throughout. Women who shifted from family care to part-time work after a long career break had lower odds of mortality than the reference group. Depressive symptoms were not associated with women’s work and family care histories.

Conclusion

Women’s work histories are predictive of their later life disability and mortality. This relationship may be useful in targeting interventions aimed at improving later life health. Further research is necessary to explore the mechanisms linking certain work histories to poorer later life health and to design interventions for those affected.

Gender career divide and women's disadvantage in depressive symptoms and physical limitations in France

This study investigated the relationship between women's disadvantage in mental health and physical functioning and gender differences in career backgrounds. Sexual division of labor persists and key career characteristics are overrepresented in women: low-skilled first job, downward occupational trajectory, interruptions. These interrelated characteristics are usually linked to poor health. Their overrepresentation in women may be related to the female-male health gap; however, it may not if overrepresentation transposed into substantially weaker associations with poor health outcomes. To address this question, we used the French population survey "Health and Occupational Trajectories" (2006) and focused on 45-74 year-old individuals who ever worked (n=7537). Past career characteristics were qualified by retrospective information. Logistic regressions identified past characteristics related to current depressive symptoms and physical limitations. Non-linear decomposition showed whether these characteristics contributed to the gender health gap, through their different distribution and/or association with health. The overrepresentation of unskilled first jobs, current and past inactivity and unemployment in women contributed to their excess depressive symptoms. These contributions were only slightly reduced by the weaker mental health-relatedness of current inactivity in women and increased by the stronger relatedness of low-skilled and self-employed first jobs. Overrepresentation of current inactivity, past interruptions and downward trajectories also contributed positively to women's excess physical limitations. Gender-specific career backgrounds were significantly linked to women's disadvantage in mental health and physical functioning. We need to further explore whether equalization of opportunities, especially at the early stages and in terms of career continuity, could help to reduce women's mental and physical health disadvantage.

Is being in paid work beyond state pension age beneficial for health? Evidence from England using a life-course approach

Background

Given the current policy emphasis in many Western societies on extending working lives, we investigated the health effects of being in paid work beyond state pension age (SPA). Until now, work has largely focused on the health of those who exit the labour force early.

Methods

Our data come from waves 2–4 of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, including the life history interview at wave 3. Using logistic and linear regression models, we assessed the longitudinal associations between being in paid work beyond SPA and 3 measures of health (depression, a latent measure of somatic health and sleep disturbance) among men aged 65–74 and women aged 60–69. Our analyses controlled for baseline health and socioeconomic characteristics, as well as for work histories and health in adulthood and childhood.

Results

Approximately a quarter of women and 15% of men were in paid work beyond SPA. Descriptive bivariate analyses suggested that men and women in paid work were more likely to report better health at follow-up. However, once baseline socioeconomic characteristics as well as adulthood and baseline health and labour market histories were accounted for, the health benefits of working beyond SPA were no longer significant.

Conclusions

Potential health benefits of working beyond SPA need to be considered in the light of the fact that those who report good health and are more socioeconomically advantaged are more likely to be working beyond SPA to begin with.

Work-family life courses and BMI trajectories in three British birth cohorts

BACKGROUND/OBJECTIVES:

Combining work and family responsibilities has previously been associated with improved health in mid-life, yet little is known about how these associations change over time (both biographical and historical) and whether this extends to body mass index (BMI) trajectories for British men and women. The purpose of this study was to investigate relationships between work-family life courses and BMI trajectories across adulthood (16–42 years) for men and women in three British birth cohorts.

SUBJECTS/METHODS:

Multiply imputed data from three nationally representative British birth cohorts were used—the MRC National Survey of Health and Development (NSHD; 1946 birth cohort, n=3012), the National Child Development Study (NCDS; 1958 birth cohort, n=9614) and the British Cohort Study (BCS; 1970 birth cohort, n=8140). A typology of work-family life course types was developed using multi-channel sequence analysis, linking annual information on work, partnerships and parenthood from 16 to 42 years. Work-family life courses were related to BMI trajectories using multi-level growth models. Analyses adjusted for indicators of prior health, birthweight, child BMI, educational attainment and socioeconomic position across the life course, and were stratified by gender and cohort.

RESULTS:

Work-family life courses characterised by earlier transitions to parenthood and weaker long-term links to employment were associated with greater increases in BMI across adulthood. Some of these differences, particularly for work-family groups, which are becoming increasingly non-normative, became more pronounced across cohorts (for example, increases in BMI between 16 and 42 years in long-term homemaking women: NSHD: 4.35 kg m^–2, 95% confidence interval (CI): 3.44, 5.26; NCDS: 5.53 kg m^–2, 95% CI: 5.18, 5.88; BCS: 6.69 kg m^–2, 95% CI: 6.36, 7.02).

CONCLUSIONS:

Becoming a parent earlier and weaker long-term ties to employment are associated with greater increases in BMI across adulthood in British men and women.

Work-Family Life Courses and Metabolic Markers in the MRC National Survey of Health and Development

The aim was to investigate whether the combined work-family life courses of British men and women were associated with differences in metabolic markers-waist circumference, blood pressure, high density lipoprotein cholesterol, triglycerides, and glycated haemoglobin-in mid-life. We used data from the Medical Research Council's National Survey of Health and Development-the 1946 British birth cohort. Multi-channel sequence analysis was used to create a typology of eight work-family life course types combining information on work, partnerships and parenthood between ages 16-51. Linear regression tested associations between work-family types and metabolic outcomes at age 53 on multiply imputed data (20 imputations) of >2,400 participants. Compared with men with strong ties to employment and early transitions to family life, men who made later transitions to parenthood and maintained strong ties to paid work had smaller waist circumferences (-2.16cm, 95% CI: -3.73, -0.59), lower triglycerides (9.78% lower, 95% CI: 0.81, 17.94) and lower blood pressure (systolic: -4.03mmHg, 95% CI: -6.93, -1.13; diastolic: -2.34mmHg, 95% CI: -4.15, -0.53). Married men and women who didn't have children had increased high density lipoprotein cholesterol (7.23% higher, 95% CI: 0.68, 14.21) and lower waist circumferences (-4.67cm, 95% CI: -8.37, -0.97), respectively. For men later transitions to parenthood combined with strong ties to paid work were linked to reduced metabolic risk in mid-life. Fewer differences between work-family types and metabolic markers were seen for women.