Childhood living conditions, education and health among the oldest old in Sweden

Abstract

The objectives were to investigate the associations between social and financial living conditions in childhood, education and morbidity in old age. The study population (N = 591; 76+ years old) was assembled from two nationally representative Swedish surveys, in 1968 and 2011, that together made longitudinal analysis possible. Morbidity in old age comprised self-reported measures of musculoskeletal disorders, cardiovascular disease, self-rated health and impaired mobility. There were no independent associations between adverse childhood living conditions and morbidity. However, adverse childhood living conditions were associated with an increased likelihood of low education. Moreover, low education was associated with a higher probability of health problems in old age. The results did not show any associations between adverse childhood conditions and late-life morbidity. However, adverse childhood conditions were associated with lower levels of education which, in turn, was associated with health problems and attrition from the study. These results suggest that adverse childhood conditions may indeed be associated with health and survival in old age, but mainly through mechanisms acting earlier in the lifecourse.

Linking financial hardship throughout the life-course with psychological distress in old age: Sensitive period, accumulation of risks, and chain of risks hypotheses

“…Financial hardship in childhood, psychological distress and financial hardship in adulthood, lower education, and not being employed affect outcomes later in life and finally psychological distress in old age. In line with earlier studies, we found that education and employment mediate the link between childhood conditions and later-life health (Berndt & Fors 2015;Laaksonen et al 2007). Our results indicate that childhood conditions affect a broad spectrum of areas related to inequality and health inequality; however, childhood conditions did not seem to have longlasting irrevocable effects.…”

“…How childhood conditions impact later health is not fully understood. For example, some studies have found a direct association between childhood socioeconomic position and mental health later on (Evans 2016;Fors et al 2009), whereas others have found the effect to be mediated through other factors, such as education and income (Quesnel-Vallée & Taylor 2012;Laaksonen et al 2007;Berndt & Fors 2015). In the current study, which used a model that simultaneously tested the sensitive period, chains of risks, and accumulation of risks hypotheses, financial hardship in childhood was independently associated with psychological distress in old age at follow-up 2 (changes from age 61 to 70) but not follow-up 3 (age 81).…”

“…Adverse childhood living conditions have been linked with lower cognition and more mental disorders in later life (Laaksonen et al 2007;Fors et al 2009). Others did not find support for childhood as a sensitive period because that the association was explained by education (Quesnel-Vallée & Taylor 2012;Berndt & Fors 2015).…”

“…Wickham and colleagues (2017) have shown that transitioning into poverty in childhood increases the risk for socioemotional problems in adolescence; others have found that mental disorders in adolescence increase the risk for educational underachievement and unemployment (Fergusson & Woodward 2002). However, education has been found to be a mediating factor from adverse childhood conditions to old age health (Quesnel-Vallée & Taylor 2012;Berndt & Fors 2015), whereas others have not found evidence that education is a mediator between financial hardship and mental health (Laaksonen et al 2007). Moreover, unemployment and low levels of education increase the risk for mental disorders in midlife (Linander et al 2015).…”

Growing Up in Poverty, Growing Old in Infirmity: The Long Arm of Childhood Conditions in Great Britain

“…In 2000, for example, Finns aged 56–66 suffering early life stress sustained from being evacuated to Sweden and Denmark during World War II, compared to those who stayed in the country, showed higher systolic and diastolic blood pressure [ 11 ]. Meanwhile in Sweden researchers found no association between childhood conditions and later life health outcomes (self-report of general health, mobility problems, cardiovascular diseases and musculoskeletal disorders) once educational attainment earlier in the life course was considered [ 12 ].…”