Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-dh8gc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T04:50:46.890Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Living arrangements and marital status: a register-based study of survival of older adults in Belgium at the beginning of the 21st century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 September 2015

ANNE HERM ,
JON ANSON  and
MICHEL POULAIN
ANNE HERM*
Affiliation:
Estonian Institute for Population Studies, Tallinn University, Estonia.
JON ANSON
Affiliation:
Department of Social Work, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel.
MICHEL POULAIN
Affiliation:
Estonian Institute for Population Studies, Tallinn University, Estonia. IACCHOS (Institute for the Analysis of Change in Historical and Contemporary Societies), Université catholique de Louvain, Charleroi, Belgium.
*
Address for correspondence: Anne Herm, Estonian Institute for Population Studies, Tallinn University, Uus-Sadama 5, 10120 Tallinn, Estonia E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Being married reduces the mortality risk of older persons. More generally, living arrangements that include co-residence with a source of support and a close care-giver are associated with a lower mortality risk. We build a detailed typology of private and collective living arrangements, including marital status, and check its association with mortality risks, controlling for health status. Using administrative data from the population register, we identify the living arrangement of all individuals aged 65 years and over living in Belgium as at 1 January 2002, and their survival during the year 2002. Data on health status are extracted from the 2001 census. We use binary logistic regression with the probability to die as outcome and living arrangement, health, age and gender as covariates. Our results show that mortality is more closely associated with actual living arrangements than with marital status. This association is age and gender-specific and remains even at very old ages. Living with a spouse is confirmed to be beneficial for survival but in older age living alone becomes more favourable. Of all living arrangements, older persons living in religious communities experience the lowest mortality risk whereas those living in nursing homes experience the highest risk.

Keywords

mortalityolder personliving arrangementsmarital statusnursing homereligious communities
Type
Articles
Information
Ageing & Society , Volume 36 , Issue 10 , November 2016 , pp. 2141 - 2162
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anson, O. 1989. Marital status and women's health revisited: the importance of a proximate adult. Journal of Marriage and Family, 51, 1, 185–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ben-Shlomo, Y., Smith, G. D., Shipley, M. and Marmot, G. 1993. Magnitude and causes of mortality differences between married and unmarried men. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 47, 3, 200–5.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Blomgren, J., Martikainen, P., Grundy, E. and Koskinen, S. 2012. Marital history 1971–91 and mortality 1991–2004 in England & Wales and Finland. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 66, 1, 30–6.Google Scholar
Bōrsch-Supan, A., McFadden, D. and Schnabel, R. 1996. Living arrangement, health and wealth effects. In Wise, D. (ed.), Advances in the Economics of Aging. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 193–218.Google Scholar
Davis, M. A., Moritz, D. J., Neuhaus, J. M., Barclay, J. D. and Gee, L. 1997. Living arrangement, changes in living arrangement and survival among community dwelling older adults. American Journal of Public Health, 87, 3, 371–7.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Davis, M. A., Neuhaus, J. M., Moritz, D. J. and Segal, M. R. 1992. Living arrangements and survival among middle-aged and older adults in the NHANES I Epidemiologic Follow-up Study. American Journal of Public Health, 82, 3, 401–6.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Drefahl, S. 2010. How does the age gap between partners affect their survival? Demography, 47, 2, 313–26.Google Scholar
Drefahl, S. 2012. Do the married really live longer? The role of co-residence and socioeconomic status. Journal of Marriage and Family, 74, 3, 462–75.Google Scholar
Durkheim, E. 1951 [1897]. Suicide: A Study in Sociology. The Free Press, Glencoe, Illinois.Google Scholar
Farr, W. 1858. The influence of marriage on the mortality of the French people. In Hastings, G. W. (ed.), Transactions of the National Association for the Promotion of Social Sciences. John W. Parker & Son, London, 504–13.Google Scholar
Foster, D., Klinger-Vartabedian, L. and Wispé, L. 1984. Male longevity and age differences between spouses. Journal of Gerontology, 39, 1, 117–20.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fox, A. J., Bulusu, L. and Kinlen, L. 1979. Mortality and age differences in marriage. Journal of Biological Science, 11, 2, 117–31.Google ScholarPubMed
Goldman, N., Korenman, S. and Weinstein, R. 1995. Marital status and health among the elderly. Social Science and Medicine, 40, 12, 1717–30.Google Scholar
Gove, W. R. 1973. Sex, marital status, and mortality. American Journal of Sociology, 79, 1, 45–67.Google Scholar
Grundy, E. 2011. Household transitions and subsequent mortality among older people in England and Wales: trends over three decades. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 65, 4, 353–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Grundy, E. and Tomassini, C. 2010. Marital history, health and mortality among older men and women in England and Wales. BMC Public Health, 10, 1, 554.Google Scholar
Guilbault, C., Dal, L. and Poulain, M. 2007. Le veuvage et après. Gérontologie et société, 121, 2, 163–78.Google Scholar
Helsing, K. J., Szklo, M. and Comstock, G. W. 1981. Factors associated with mortality after widowhood. American Journal of Public Health, 71, 8, 802–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Herm, A., Poulain, M. and Anson, J. 2014. Excess mortality risks in institutions: the influence of health and disability status. In Anson, J. and Luy, M. (eds), Mortality in an International Perspective. Springer, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 245–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hu, Y. and Goldman, N. 1990. Mortality differentials by marital status: an international comparison. Demography, 27, 2, 233–50.Google Scholar
Joutsenniemi, K., Martelin, T., Koskinen, S., Martikainen, P., Härkaänen, T., Luoto, R. and Aromaa, A. 2006. Official marital status, cohabiting, and self-rated health – time trends in Finland, 1978–2001. European Journal of Public Health, 16, 5, 476–83.Google Scholar
Klein, T. 1996. Determinants of institutionalization in old age. In Eisen, R. and Sloan, F. A. (eds), Long-term Care: Economic Issues and Policy Solutions. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Boston, Massachusetts, 103–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klinger-Vartabedian, L. and Wispé, L. 1989. Age differences in marriage and female longevity. Journal of Marriage and Family, 51, 1, 195–202.Google Scholar
Koskinen, S., Joutsenniemi, K., Martelin, T. and Martikainen, P. 2007. Mortality differences according to living arrangement. International Journal of Epidemiology, 36, 6, 1255–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lillard, L. A. and Panins, C. W. 1996. Marital status and mortality: the role of health. Demography, 33, 3, 313–27.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Liu, H. and Reczek, C. 2012. Cohabitation and U.S. adult mortality: an examination by gender and race. Journal of Marriage and Family, 74, 4, 794–811.Google Scholar
Lusyne, P., Page, H. and Lievens, J. 2001. Mortality following conjugal bereavement, Belgium 1991–96: the unexpected effect of education. Population Studies, 55, 3, 281–9.Google Scholar
Luy, M. 2003. Causes of male excess mortality: insights from cloistered populations. Population and Development Review, 29, 4, 647–76.Google Scholar
Luy, M., Flandorfer, P. and Di Giulio, P. 2015. Ageing in an aged society: experiences and attitudes of Catholic order members towards population ageing and older people. Ageing & Society, 35, 1, 1–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Manzoli, L., Villari, P., Pirone, G. M. and Boccia, A. 2007. Marital status and mortality in the elderly: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Social Science and Medicine, 64, 1, 77–94.Google Scholar
Martikainen, P., Moustgaard, H., Einiö, E. and Murphy, M. 2014. Life expectancy in long-term care by marital status: multistate life table estimates for older Finnish men and women. Journals of Gerontology: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 69B, 2, 303–10.Google Scholar
Martikainen, P. and Valkonen, T. 1996. Mortality after death of spouse in relation to duration of bereavement in Finland. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 50, 3, 264–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nihtilä, E. and Martikainen, P. 2008. Why older people living with a spouse are less likely to be institutionalized: the role of socio-economic factors and health characteristics. Scandinavian Journal of Public Health, 36, 1, 35–43.Google Scholar
Poulain, M. and Herm, A. 2013. Central population registers as a source of demographic statistics in Europe. Population-E, 68, 2, 183–212.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rendall, M. S., Weden, M. M., Favreault, M. M. and Waldron, H. 2011. The protective effect of marriage for survival: a review and update. Demography, 48, 2, 481–506.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robards, J., Evandrou, M., Falkingham, J. and Vlachantonia, A. 2012. Marital status, health and mortality. Maturitas, 73, 4, 295–9.Google Scholar
Seeman, T., Kaplan, G., Knudsen, L., Cohen, R. and Guralnik, J. 1987. Social network ties and mortality among the elderly in the Alameda County Study. American Journal of Epidemiology, 126, 4, 714–23.Google Scholar
Staehelin, K., Schindler, C., Spoerri, A., Zemp Stutz, E. and The Swiss National Cohort Study Group 2012. Marital status, living arrangement and mortality: does the association vary by gender? Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 66, 7, e22.Google Scholar
Uchino, B. 2004. Social support and physical health: understanding the health consequences of relationships. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 4, 3, 237–55.Google Scholar
Zunzunegui, M. V., Beland, F. and Otero, A. 2001. Support from children, living arrangement, self-rated health and depressive symptoms of older people in Spain. International Journal of Epidemiology, 30, 5, 1090–9.Google Scholar