中国老年人隔代照料与 健康后果的实证研究及政策思考

在中国家庭代际关系的研究中,隔代照料这一选题极为重要,隔代照料也是老年和家庭福利政策制定的重要影响因素。老年人隔代照料与健康问题日益受到国内学者的关注,但对两者相关性的深入实证考察较少,仅有的研究也未就隔代照料产生的健康后果达成共识,政策应对亦存局限。为此,本文基于2014年中国老年社会追踪调查(CLASS)截面数据,探讨中国老年人照料孙子女对自身健康产生的后果及几个主要变量之间的交互作用,对其进行量化研究并通过稳健性检验。研究得出三项基本结论:隔代照料的健康后果受到照料强度、子女特征、居住模式及老年人自身罹患慢性疾病状况的影响,在不同的特征状况下呈现不同的健康结果;照料者受教育程度、照料者性别、健在子女数等变量间的交互作用对被解释变量(照料者健康)产生了不同程度的调节作用,成年子女向上的代际支持也对老年照料者的健康发挥了调节作用;使用工具变量(照料者是否享受老年优待政策)进行因果识别在一定程度上克服了解释变量与被解释变量间的内生性问题。最后,本文基于上述实证研究的结果从代际关系视角、社会性别视角和老年婚姻社会功能等方面提出公共政策的应对思考,以期为制定相应的老年和家庭福利政策提供策略和依据。

The Quantitative Study of Relationships between Grandparenting and Health Outcome and Implications for Public Policy

Grandparenting is an important topic in the intergeneration studies in the Chinese context,and becomes the influential factor for the elderly and family social welfare policy on the state level. The study between the grandparenting and health outcome has got increasing attention among the Chinese scholars,the quantitative studies,however,are relatively new. The existing quantitative studies are inconsistent which results to the limited public policy implication as well. This study,therefore,is trying to make this gap. The research finds are including but not limited to:The health outcome of grandparenting are confined by the intensity of this activity/the character of the children(the middle generation)/living arrangement/the prevalence chronic disease,the health outcome depends on the different condition;The interaction effects among education attainment/gender of caregivers/the amount of the alive children have the mediation effect to the health outcome;The application of the instrumental variable(Whether have the social welfare specialized for elderly population)has overcome the endogenous problem. Based on the above finding,this paper concludes with the following perspective for policy implications:generation relationship/social gender/the marriage statement of the elderly caregivers.