Have We Put an End to Social Promotion? Changes in School Progress among Children Aged 6 to 17 from 1972 to 2005

We examine trends over time in the proportion of children below the modal grade for their age (BMG), a proxy for grade retention, and in the effects of its demographic and socioeconomic correlates. We estimate a logistic regression model with partial constraints predicting BMG using the annual October school enrollment supplements of the Current Population Survey. This model identifies systematic variation in the effects of social background across age and time from 1972 to 2005. While the effects of socioeconomic background variables on progress through school have become increasingly powerful as children grow older, that typical pattern has been attenuated across the past three decades by a steady secular decline in the influence of those variables across all ages. A great deal of concern has been expressed about rising levels of economic and social inequality in the United States since the middle 1970s, and about the potential intergenerational effects of such inequality. However, there has been an opposite trend in the effects of social origins on being BMG. A trend is not a law, and there is reason to be concerned about the recent deceleration of the secular decline in effects of social background on being BMG.     

Levels of Support from Children in Taiwan: Expectations versus Reality, 1965–99

Both population aging and the socioeconomic changes that often accompany it have effects on intergenerational arrangements. As a result, assessing the evolving social contract among family members is a key part of the research agenda. Studies monitoring these effects and other consequences are relatively new. Another way to gain insight is through a historical analysis that (a) traces how expectations for old‐age support have changed over recent decades for cohorts advancing through their life cycle, and (b) measures how well expectations accord with actual patterns. This article uses a series of fertility surveys in Taiwan from 1965 to the 1990s to trace expectations for coresidence among cohorts of young married women and to compare these expectations with the actual living arrangements observed in surveys of the elderly in the 1990s. The results indicate sharp shifts in expectations for each of the cohorts as they aged. These shifts reflect a response to respondents' own life course events and the changing socioeconomic environment and show large and persistent differentials by education throughout the period. These factors tend to bring expectations into fairly close concordance with the actual living arrangements observed some years later.     

On the distribution of completed parities when fertility is heritable

Over the last one hundred years, there has been, in many developed countries, a demographic convergence towards the two child family. The possible implications for population growth of such a tendency are considered in this paper in terms of both family limitation and also the intergenerational transmission of fertility. These two effects interact so that as the proportion of two‐child families increases, the possible influence of mother‐daughter fertility associations on population growth decreases, though even now it could override otherwise significant changes in either or both of the birth and death intensities. In particular, it is shown that according as to how fertility is transmitted through generations, it is still possible to have zero growth rates consistently with a widely dispersed stable distribution of family size as well as a typical mortality regime.     

Comparing Observed and Unobserved Components of Childhood: Evidence From Finnish Register Data on Midlife Mortality From Siblings and Their Parents

In this study, we argue that the long arm of childhood that determines adult mortality should be thought of as comprising an observed part and its unobserved counterpart, reflecting the observed socioeconomic position of individuals and their parents and unobserved factors shared within a family. Our estimates of the observed and unobserved parts of the long arm of childhood are based on family-level variance in a survival analytic regression model, using siblings nested within families as the units of analysis. The study uses a sample of Finnish siblings born between 1936 and 1950 obtained from Finnish census data. Individuals are followed from ages 35 to 72. To explain familial influence on mortality, we use demographic background factors, the socioeconomic position of the parents, and the individuals’ own socioeconomic position at age 35 as predictors of all-cause and cause-specific mortality. The observed part—demographic and socioeconomic factors, including region; number of siblings; native language; parents’ education and occupation; and individuals’ income, occupation, tenancy status, and education—accounts for between 10 % and 25 % of the total familial influence on mortality. The larger part of the influence of the family on mortality is not explained by observed individual and parental socioeconomic position or demographic background and thus remains an unobserved component of the arm of childhood. This component highlights the need to investigate the influence of childhood circumstances on adult mortality in a comprehensive framework, including demographic, social, behavioral, and genetic information from the family of origin.     

On the distribution of completed parities when fertility is heritable

"Over the last one hundred years, there has been, in many developed countries, a demographic convergence towards the two child family. The possible implications for population growth of such a tendency are considered in this paper in terms of both family limitation and also the intergenerational transmission of fertility. These two effects interact so that as the proportion of two-child families increases, the possible influence of mother-daughter fertility associations on population growth decreases, though even now it could override otherwise significant changes in either or both of the birth and death intensities. In particular, it is shown that according...to how fertility is transmitted through generations, it is still possible to have zero growth rates consistently with a widely dispersed stable distribution of family size as well as a typical mortality regime." (SUMMARY IN FRE)     

Diverging Mobility Trajectories: Grandparent Effects on Educational Attainment in One- and Two-Parent Families in the United States

In recent years, sociological research investigating grandparent effects in three-generation social mobility has proliferated, mostly focusing on the question of whether grandparents have a direct effect on their grandchildren’s social attainment. This study hypothesizes that prior research has overlooked family structure as an important factor that moderates grandparents’ direct effects. Capitalizing on a counterfactual causal framework and multigenerational data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, this study examines the direct effect of grandparents’ years of education on grandchildren’s years of educational attainment and heterogeneity in the effects associated with family structure. The results show that for both African Americans and whites, grandparent effects are the strongest for grandchildren who grew up in two-parent families, followed by those in single-parent families with divorced parents. The weakest effects were marked in single-parent families with unmarried parents. These findings suggest that the increasing diversity of family forms has led to diverging social mobility trajectories for families across generations.     

The Schooling of Offspring and the Survival of Parents

Contemporary stratification research on developed societies usually views the intergenerational transmission of educational advantage as a one-way effect from parent to child. However, parents’ investment in their offspring’s schooling may yield significant returns for parents themselves in later life. For instance, well-educated offspring have greater knowledge of health and technology to share with their parents and more financial means to provide for them than do their less-educated counterparts. We use data from the 1992–2006 Health and Retirement Study (HRS) to examine whether adult offspring’s educational attainments are associated with parents’ survival in the United States. We show that adult offspring’s educational attainments have independent effects on their parents’ mortality, even after controlling for parents’ own socioeconomic resources. This relationship is more pronounced for deaths that are linked to behavioral factors: most notably, chronic lower respiratory disease and lung cancer. Furthermore, at least part of the association between offspring’s schooling and parents’ survival may be explained by parents’ health behaviors, including smoking and physical activity. These findings suggest that one way to influence the health of the elderly is through their offspring. To harness the full value of schooling for health, then, a family and multigenerational perspective is needed.     

The impact of intermarriage on ethnic stratification: Jews in Israel

We investigate macro-level implications of ethnic/racial intermarriage in one generation on ethnic/racial inequality in the subsequent generation. In our theoretical model, ethnic intermarriage affects ethnic stratification through intergenerational transmissions of socioeconomic status and ethnicity. The effects of ethnic intermarriage depend on the association between ethnic intermarriage and socioeconomic status in the parents’ generation, as well as the association between ethnic (self-)identification and socioeconomic status in the offspring generation. The model suggests that under plausible scenarios, intermarriage may increase socioeconomic gaps across ethnic groups. Thus, the model's predictions temper those of assimilation and melting pot theories, which suggest that ethnic intermarriage unequivocally reduces ethnic inequality.     

Understanding links between adolescent health and educational attainment

The educational and economic consequences of poor health during childhood and adolescence have become increasingly clear, with a resurgence of evidence leading researchers to reconsider the potentially significant contribution of early-life health to population welfare both within and across generations. Meaningful relationships between early-life health and educational attainment raise important questions about how health may influence educational success in young adulthood and beyond, as well as for whom its influence is strongest. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997, I examine how adolescents’ health and social status act together to create educational disparities in young adulthood, focusing on two questions in particular. First, does the link between adolescent health and educational attainment vary across socioeconomic and racial/ethnic groups? Second, what academic factors explain the connection between adolescent health and educational attainment? The findings suggest that poorer health in adolescence is strongly negatively related to educational attainment, net of both observed confounders and unobserved, time-invariant characteristics within households. The reduction in attainment is particularly large for non-Hispanic white adolescents, suggesting that the negative educational consequences of poor health are not limited to only the most socially disadvantaged adolescents. Finally, I find that the link between adolescent health and educational attainment is explained by academic factors related to educational participation and, most importantly, academic performance, rather than by reduced educational expectations. These findings add complexity to our understanding of how the educational consequences of poor health apply across the social hierarchy, as well as why poor health may lead adolescents to complete less schooling.In a presidential address to the Population Association of America, Palloni (2006) emphasized the need for research on early-life health as a mechanism in the intergenerational transmission of socioeconomic status. Although poor health is well known as a consequence of childhood and family socioeconomic conditions, it is also clear that illness during childhood and adolescence has lasting educational and socioeconomic effects (Case, Fertig, and Paxson 2005; Conley and Bennett 2000; Smith 2005). What remains less clear is how health early in life influences educational success in young adulthood and beyond. Do those with a health disadvantage graduate from high school at lower rates, for example, because they perform poorly in school or because they and their families develop reduced expectations for the future? In addition, how do race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status complicate these relationships? Our understanding of how health’s influence on educational attainment differs across groups is unclear.This article considers these complexities by asking several questions. It confirms that health during adolescence is strongly negatively associated with educational attainment and then examines this relationship in greater depth than is typical. First, I examine variation in the link between health and educational attainment along socioeconomic and racial/ethnic lines. Are the families of adolescents in poorer health better able to mitigate the negative educational consequences of a condition if they are socially and/or economically advantaged? Or do youths in these families suffer an equal or greater disadvantage? Second, I evaluate the role of academic factors—specifically, educational participation, performance, and expectations—that may explain the connection between adolescents’ health and educational attainment. I examine these questions with data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (NLSY97), with an overall goal of understanding the ways in which health and social status act together to create educational disparities in the early life course.     

Does regional variation affect ecological mortality research? An examination of mortality, income inequality and health infrastructure in the Mississippi Delta

Mortality research has often focused on individual-level, socioeconomic, and demographic factors indicating health outcomes. Consistent with a recent trend in the public health field, this research examines mortality at the aggregate, contextual level. Based on Wilkinson’s relative income hypothesis, specifically being manifest through an underinvestment in social goods including health infrastructure, the focus of this study is a regional examination in the effects of income inequality on mortality at the county level. Health infrastructure is included as a mediating variable in the relationship between income inequality and mortality, relating back to Wilkinson’s work. Unlike previous research, regional differences in this relationship are examined to identify variation at the county level in health outcomes. The Mississippi Delta is an adequate test bed to examine the relationship between these variables based on its socioeconomic, demographic, and high inequality characteristics. It is hypothesized that Delta-designated counties within the three-state Delta region distinguish a significant positive relationship between income inequality and mortality, that this relationship is stronger than in non-Delta classified counties, and that health infrastructure significantly mediates the relationship between income inequality and mortality.     

The intergenerational transmission of fertility in contemporary Denmark: The effects of number of siblings (full and half), birth order,and whether male or female

Using the Danish Fertility Database, we investigate intergenerational fertility transmission, including the relationship between the number of children born to those aged 25 and 26 years in 1994 and the number of their full sibs and half-sibs. We find that the fertility behaviour of parents and their children is positively correlated, and that half-sibs and full sibs have broadly similar effects. We do not find, in this complete national population, the strong birth order effects reported in some earlier studies. Nor do we find evidence of a weakening of intergenerational fertility transmission over time, perhaps because the greater flexibility of lifestyles in this post-transitional phase provides the extended social space within which intergenerational continuities can manifest themselves. We show that members of large families are over-represented in subsequent generations - that they have far more kin than those from smaller families - and that intergenerational continuities in fertility behaviour play a substantial role in keeping fertility higher than it would be in the absence of such transmission.     

The intergenerational transmission of fertility in contemporary Denmark: the effects of number of siblings (full and half), birth order,and whether male or female

Using the Danish Fertility Database, we investigate intergenerational fertility transmission, including the relationship between the number of children born to those aged 25 and 26 years in 1994 and the number of their full sibs and half-sibs. We find that the fertility behaviour of parents and their children is positively correlated, and that half-sibs and full sibs have broadly similar effects. We do not find, in this complete national population, the strong birth order effects reported in some earlier studies. Nor do we find evidence of a weakening of intergenerational fertility transmission over time, perhaps because the greater flexibility of lifestyles in this post-transitional phase provides the extended social space within which intergenerational continuities can manifest themselves. We show that members of large families are over-represented in subsequent generations - that they have far more kin than those from smaller families - and that intergenerational continuities in fertility behaviour play a substantial role in keeping fertility higher than it would be in the absence of such transmission.     

The United States at mid-decade

This report examines the demographic forces at work in the US that will influence the country's future. A profile of the US population in the mid-1990s reveals that the US is the third most populated countries in the world and one of the fastest growing of the industrialized countries. 70% of this growth is due to natural increase and 30% to immigration. The first topic covered in this report, geographic patterns of growth and change, includes a consideration of regional patterns, population growth by state, residential patterns, and the increase in the number of minorities living in suburban areas. The second topic is the changing age structure, which is characterized by an aging of the population and an increase in the number of children. Racial and ethnic diversity is discussed in terms of fastest growing groups, where minorities live, the Native American population, and the impact of this diversity on political participation. Immigration is analyzed to reveal sources and destinations, linguistic diversity, effects on schools and the labor market, and socioeconomic effects. The section on American families focuses on trends in marriage and divorce, types of households and families, and household patterns by race/ethnicity. The last topic looks at the distribution of income and poverty as well as at regional and state differences, race/ethnicity differences, the effects of marital status on income, who constitutes the poor, and how income is distributed. In conclusion, it is noted that America's social and economic future depends upon whether current demographic trends will lead to a fragmented and divisive society or to a stronger nation built upon diversity.     

New realities of the American family

The demographic, social, and economic characteristics of American families have changed dramatically over the past few decades. While the male breadwinner/female homemaker model was long traditionally typical,l contemporary families may be openly made up of single-parents, remarried couples, unmarried couples, stepfamilies, foster families, extended or multigenerational families, or 2 families within 1 household. Families are now most likely to have 3 or fewer children, a mother employed outside of the home, and a 50% chance of parental divorce before the children are grown. These trends are common not only in America, but in most industrialized nations around the world. In fact, family trends are so fluid that the US Census Bureau and workplace policy find it difficult to keep pace. This report presents and discusses social and demographic trends behind the ever-changing face of the American family. Households and types of families are further defined, as are the living arrangements of children, young adults, and the elderly. Marriage, divorce, and remarriage trends, age at marriage rates, and interracial marriage are then discussed. Next examined are declining family size, teenage parents, contraception and abortion, unwed mothers, and technological routes to parenthood. The changing roles of family members and family economic well-being are discussed in sections preceding closing comments on the outlook for the American family.     

子代数量对农村老年人代际经济支持的影响--以亲子两代分居家庭为研究对象

子代数量与家庭支持力的关系是家庭研究中的重要问题。论文运用“中国健康与养老追踪调查”（ CHARLS）2011年全国基线调查数据,以亲子两代分居家庭为研究对象,通过非条件Logistic模型,分析了分居家庭子代数量对农村老年人代际经济支持的影响。结果表明：在控制其他变量的前提下,分居家庭中子代数量与农村老年人代际经济支持之间存在显著性相关。随着分居家庭中子代数量增加,农村老年人获得代际经济支持的递增概率存在着拐点。当分居家庭中子代数量上升至5个时,获得代际经济支持的概率最大。随着子代数量的增加,农村老年人获得代际经济支持的概率并非完全呈现正向递增的状态。     

Prenatal Exposure to an Acute Stressor and Children’s Cognitive Outcomes

Exposure to environmental stressors is highly prevalent and unequally distributed along socioeconomic lines and may have enduring negative consequences, even when experienced before birth. Yet, estimating the consequences of prenatal stress on children’s outcomes is complicated by the issue of confounding (i.e., unobserved factors correlated with stress exposure and with children’s outcomes). I combine a natural experiment—a strong earthquake in Chile—with a panel survey to capture the effect of prenatal exposure on acute stress and children’s cognitive ability. I find that stress exposure in early pregnancy has no effect on children’s cognition among middle-class families, but it has a strong negative influence among disadvantaged families. I then examine possible pathways accounting for the socioeconomic stratification in the effect of stress, including differential exposure across socioeconomic status, differential sensitivity, and parental responses. Findings suggest that the interaction between prenatal exposures and socioeconomic advantage provides a powerful mechanism for the intergenerational transmission of disadvantage.     

Interpolating demography with families and households

This paper argues that the field of household and family demography serves a critical role in the development of our understanding of the determinants and consequences of population trends. Like the community, families and households are situated between the two levels at which demographic research is ordinarily conducted — the individual and the nation-state. The results of the papers in this issue are used to illustrate the critical ways that intergenerational and gender relationships shape demographic processes.     

Family Structure and Self-Rated Health in Adolescence and Young Adulthood

While the relationship between family structure and child well-being is well-established, little is known about the specific impact of family structure on health in adolescence and young adulthood. Using data on 12,737 respondents from Waves I and III of Add Health, we examine the association between family structure (two biological/adoptive, stepfather, and single mother families at Wave I) and self-rated health in adolescence (Wave I) and young adulthood (Wave III). We build on previous literature by investigating whether the relationship between family structure and self-rated health is mediated by demographic background, socioeconomic status, parent–child relationships, external social support, and health characteristics and behaviors, and whether the influence of these factors endures into adulthood. Overall, we find that self-rated health is reduced for respondents who lived in stepfather or single mother families during adolescence, although this effect is attenuated in young adulthood. Family structure effects at both waves are explained by socioeconomic status, social support and competence, and health characteristics and behaviors. We find little evidence that demographic background or mother–child relationships mediate the relationship between family structure and self-rated health. By young adulthood, effects of most adolescent predictors are attenuated, but health assessments are largely influenced by changes in health characteristics and behaviors, and in family type.

Veteran Status,Income, and Intergenerational Mobility Across Three Cohorts of American Men

Existing research linking prior military employment with labor market outcomes has focused on comparing the relative income of veterans and nonveterans. However, people who join the armed forces are uniquely selected from the broader population, and the form and direction of selectivity has shifted over time, with differential enlistment rates by race, region, and socioeconomic status. Understanding changes in the demographic composition of enlistees and veterans has significant import for the study of social mobility, particularly given changes in the occupational structure since the mid-twentieth century and wage stagnation well into the new millennium. Furthermore, labor market polarization and increases in educational attainment since WWII raise additional concerns about the social origins of military personnel and their occupational trajectories after discharge. Using data from the National Longitudinal Surveys, we investigate how social background is linked to both income and occupational mobility among veterans from three cohorts of American men: World War II, Vietnam, and the All-Volunteer Force. We find few benefits for veterans, for either income or intergenerational occupational mobility, once social background is controlled, suggesting that selection into the armed forces largely governs outcomes in the civilian labor market. Our findings have significant importance for understanding civilian labor market outcomes and trajectories of social mobility during distinct phases of military staffing.     

Reassessing racial and socioeconomic disparities in environmental justice research

The number of studies examining racial and socioeconomic disparities in the geographic distribution of environmental hazards and locally unwanted land uses has grown considerably over the past decade. Most studies have found statistically significant racial and socioeconomic disparities associated with hazardous sites. However there is considerable variation in the magnitude of racial and socioeconomic disparities found; indeed, some studies have found none. Uncertainties also exist about the underlying causes of the disparities. Many of these uncertainties can be attributed to the failure of the most widely used method for assessing environmental disparities to adequately account for proximity between the hazard under investigation and nearby residential populations. In this article, we identify the reasons for and consequences of this failure and demonstrate ways of overcoming these shortcomings by using alternate, distance-based methods. Through the application of such methods, we show how assessments about the magnitude and causes of racial and socioeconomic disparities in the distribution of hazardous sites are changed. In addition to research on environmental inequality, we discuss how distance-based methods can be usefully applied to other areas of demographic research that explore the effects of neighborhood context on a range of social outcomes.