The Activities of the Elderly in Rural Bangladesh

Despite a mounting interest in the elderly, and a rapidly expanding literature on the subject, there is a dearth of empirical research that can shed light on their condition. For Bangladesh and the rest of South Asia, the record is very thin. With the aid of observed and retrospective data on time-use from a sample of rural Bangladeshis, this paper seeks to help redress this situation by describing the role of the elderly in the household division of labour, management, and authority. The objective is to elaborate how labour-use and activity patterns change with advancing age, for men and women and rich and poor, and to explore the broader implications of such change. Concepts of work, retirement, and dependency are critically examined. The results of several labour surveys are used to estimate the limits that the physical effects of ageing place on the labour-force participation of the elderly.     

Residency differentials in Mormon fertility

Although one of the most consistent findings of recent fertility studies is the convergence of the religious differentials in fertility, few data have been analysed to discover Mormon fertility trends and differentials. This paper, based on data obtained on 1,001 Mormon couples, is concerned with describing the effects that the dispersion of Mormon families from the Mormon centre in Utah to surrounding areas with various social conditions is having on the fertility of the re-located Mormon families. Data presented clearly show that such families do, on the average, have a lower fertility than do their Mormon contemporaries residing in the homogeneous Mormon society in Utah. They probably compromise their religious obligations to have children with the contradicting demands of their new environment. Their loyalty to these religious beliefs, however, is confirmed by data which show that they tend to have larger families in their new environments than do their non-Mormon neighbours.     

Comment on ‘minority status and family size: A comparison of explanations’ by R. Jiobu and H. Marshall

Demographers traditionally have paid little attention to tests of significance. This neglect presumably carried little risk so long as analyses used full-count census data or vital statistics data (typically with very large numbers) and as long as inter-group differences in demographic variables were larger than they are in many contexts to-day.² For a variety of reasons, this attitude may no longer be justified.     

The interrelations of marital status,fertility, family size and intelligence test scores

In this paper data relating to men born in 1924 in the two southernmost counties of Sweden, and called up for military service in 1944 are analyzed. The population registers yield certain demographic and social information about these men, and this may be related to their performance in an intelligence test administered when they were called up. The association between test scores and level of schooling on one hand, and such variables as nuptiality, age at marriage, number of sibs, marital fertility, the incidence of pre-nuptial conceptions and occupational class is discussed, and an estimate of the influence of differential fertility on the trend of intelligence is given.     

Some social characteristics of Indian immigrants to British Guiana

An analysis of the characteristics of a sample of East Indian indentured immigrants who entered British Guiana between 1865 and 1917 shows that the age, sex and caste characteristics of the immigrants are similar to those of East Indian migrants to other British colonies such as Fiji. The majority of the immigrants were Hindus belonging to the agricultural castes and on the basis of an analysis of recorded places of birth it is shown that approximately 85% of all immigrants originated in the United Provinces and Bihar.     

Racial/Ethnic and Nativity Patterns of U.S. Adolescent and Young Adult Smoking

We document racial/ethnic and nativity differences in U.S. smoking patterns among adolescents and young adults using the 2006 Tobacco Use Supplement to the Current Population Survey (n = 44,202). Stratifying the sample by nativity status within five racial/ethnic groups (Asian American, Mexican–American, other Hispanic, non-Hispanic black, and non-Hispanic white), and further by sex and age, we compare self-reports of lifetime smoking across groups. U.S.-born non-Hispanic whites, particularly men, report smoking more than individuals in other racial/ethnic/nativity groups. Some groups of young women (e.g., foreign-born and U.S.-born Asian Americans, foreign-born and U.S.-born Mexican–Americans, and foreign-born blacks) report extremely low levels of smoking. Foreign-born females in all of the 25–34 year old racial/ethnic groups exhibit greater proportions of never smoking than their U.S.-born counterparts. Heavy/moderate and light/intermittent smoking is generally higher in the older age group among U.S.-born males and females, whereas smoking among the foreign-born of both sexes is low at younger ages and remains low at older ages. Taken together, these findings highlight the importance of considering both race/ethnicity and nativity in assessments of smoking patterns and in strategies to reduce overall U.S. smoking prevalence and smoking-attributable health disparities.     

Quality and the 2010 Census

The U.S. Census Bureau has a long tradition of evaluating the results of its censuses. This paper presents evaluation results from the 2010 Census, comparing them to earlier results. The paper discusses net coverage at the national and state level, as well as by age, sex, race, and ethnic group. It discusses components of error, including estimated number missed and counted in error. It also presents data on whole-person and item imputation.     

Money Buys Financial Security and Psychological Need Satisfaction: Testing Need Theory in Affluence

The most prominent theory to explain the curvilinear relationship between income and subjective well-being (SWB) is need theory, which proposes that increased income and wealth can lead to increased well-being in poverty because money is used to satisfy basic physiological needs. The present study tests the tenets of need theory by proposing that money can buy happiness beyond poverty if the money satisfies higher-order needs. Findings indicate that in older adults (n = 1,284), as economic standing rises, so do individual perceptions of financial security (a safety need), which in turn increases overall life satisfaction. Further, a path model tested the degree to which financial security and psychological need satisfaction mediated the path from economic standing to life satisfaction and demonstrated the complete mediation through higher-order needs—there was a 66% reduction in the direct link through financial security and a 34% reduction through psychological need satisfaction. Discussion focuses on how these mediation and path models extend need theory.     

How old is old? Revising the definition based on life table criteria

Sixty‐five has long been thought of as the point of entry into “old age.”; We propose a number of life table criteria for answering the following questions: If 65 was considered appropriate four decades ago, what is the corresponding age today? If 65 was (implicitly) a male‐oriented definition four decades ago, as we believe it was, what would have been the appropriate definition for women at that time, and what is it today? We address these questions by applying our criteria to Canada, using 1951 and 1991 life tables, but the criteria could be applied equally well to other countries. For other developed countries we would expect broadly similar results.     

The differential contributions of teen drinking homophily to new and existing friendships: An empirical assessment of assortative and proximity selection mechanisms

Alcohol use is pervasive in adolescence. Though most research is concerned with how friends influence drinking, alcohol is also important for connecting teens to one another. Prior studies have not distinguished between new friendship creation, and existing friendship durability, however. We argue that accounting for distinctions in creation–durability processes is critical for understanding the selection mechanisms drawing drinkers into homophilous friendships, and the social integration that results. In order to address these issues, we applied stochastic actor based models of network dynamics to National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health data. Adolescents only modestly prefer new friendships with others who drinker similarly, but greatly prefer friends who indirectly connect them to homophilous drinkers. These indirect homophilous drinker relationships are shorter lived, however, and suggest that drinking is a social focus that connects adolescents via proximity, rather than assortativity. These findings suggest that drinking leads to more situational and superficial social integration.