Long‐Term Effects of the Demographic Transition on Family and Kinship Networks in Britain

Murphy, Michael J.

doi:10.1111/j.1728-4457.2011.00378.x

Cited by 90 publications

(86 citation statements)

References 30 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…We run one large simulation for each race group under these parameters, consistent with other microsimulation research (66,67); at the end of the simulation there are over 290,000 simulated individuals alive and above the age of 50, which yields precise estimates. Microsimulation is the most popular method of assessing how demographic processes affect kinship networks over long periods (22,68). Demographic microsimulation works by simulating the behaviors of a hypothetical population of individual agents over time, allowing them to marry, divorce, remarry, have children, and die probabilistically at specified age-sex-state-specific rates, where states can be any category such as parity, marital status, or ethnicity.…”

Section: Approach Methods Data and Measuresmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We draw on theories of cohort succession and demographic metabolism (21) and the methods of computational demography (22,23) to examine the changing population of kinless individuals in American society over the coming decades. Prior research has examined the increasing percentages and numbers of people who lack specific types of kin, such as the never married (24,25) or the childless (26,27), but few studies have put these factors together to consider the subpopulation that simultaneously lacks multiple types of close kin and is at elevated risk of social isolation, loneliness, and hardship (15,28).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Projections of white and black older adults without living kin in the United States, 2015 to 2060

Verdery

Margolis

2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Close kin provide many important functions as adults age, affecting health, financial well-being, and happiness. Those without kin report higher rates of loneliness and experience elevated risks of chronic illness and nursing facility placement. Historical racial differences and recent shifts in core demographic rates suggest that white and black older adults in the United States may have unequal availability of close kin and that this gap in availability will widen in the coming decades. Whereas prior work explores the changing composition and size of the childless population or those without spouses, here we consider the kinless population of older adults with no living close family members and how this burden is changing for different race and sex groups. Using demographic microsimulation and the United States Census Bureau's recent national projections of core demographic rates by race, we examine two definitions of kinlessness: those without a partner or living children, and those without a partner, children, siblings, or parents. Our results suggest dramatic growth in the size of the kinless population as well as increasing racial disparities in percentages kinless. These conclusions are driven by declines in marriage and are robust to different assumptions about the future trajectory of divorce rates or growth in nonmarital partnerships. Our findings draw attention to the potential expansion of older adult loneliness, which is increasingly considered a threat to population health, and the unequal burden kinlessness may place on black Americans.O lder adults without kin are some of the most disadvantaged and isolated members of society (1, 2), because close kin are vital sources of social support that affect social, economic, and physical well-being (3, 4). The availability of kin is repeatedly implicated in studies of healthy aging (5, 6), and lacking kin is among the social factors most positively associated with nursing facility placement and quality of care (7, 8). Loneliness appears to be increasing among older adults (9) and is more strongly associated with early mortality than smoking and excessive alcohol consumption (10). Because kin make up the dominant share of most Americans' close confidante networks (11), it is no surprise that loneliness is most prevalent among the never married, widowed, and divorced as well as the childless and those without partners (12, 13). Of course, not all close kin are in contact, geographically proximate, emotionally intimate, or willing or able to exchange resources, but the availability of kin is a necessary condition for their provision of such functions (14). For these reasons, it is important to examine the population dynamics of those who lack close kin (15). In the American kinship system (16), demographic events determine the availability of kin, with marriage and fertility producing kin and death and divorce reducing them. The clear links between demographic processes and kinship networks (17, 18) imply that ongoing demographic changes in American society ...

show abstract

Section: Approach Methods Data and Measuresmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Projections of white and black older adults without living kin in the United States, 2015 to 2060

Verdery

Margolis

2017

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Fertility postponement since the 1960s has delayed the transition to grandparenthood across cohorts (Leopold and Skopek 2015a;Margolis 2016) despite past expectations that the length of grandparenthood would continue to increase because of gains in longevity (Murphy 2011;Uhlenberg 1996). Leopold and Skopek (2015a) examined transitions to grandparenthood across the 1929-1958 birth cohorts in East and West Germany, finding that grandparenthood had been delayed by about three months per year across succeeding cohorts.…”

Section: Background Healthy Grandparenthood Across Historical and Natmentioning

confidence: 99%

Healthy Grandparenthood: How Long Is It, and How Has It Changed?

Margolis

Wright

2017

Demography

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Healthy grandparenthood represents the period of overlap during which grandparents and grandchildren can build relationships, and grandparents can make intergenerational transfers to younger kin. The health of grandparents has important implications for upward and downward intergenerational transfers within kinship networks in aging societies. Although the length of grandparenthood is determined by fertility and mortality patterns, the amount of time spent as a healthy grandparent is also affected by morbidity. In this study, we estimate the length of healthy grandparenthood for the first time. Using U.S. and Canadian data, we examine changes in the length of healthy grandparenthood during years when grandparenthood was postponed, health improved, and mortality declined. We also examine variation in healthy grandparenthood by education and race/ethnicity within the United States. Our findings show that the period of healthy grandparenthood is becoming longer because of improvements in health and mortality, which more than offset delays in grandparenthood. Important variation exists within the United States by race/ethnicity and education, which has important implications for family relationships and transfers.

show abstract

“…A number of authors have recently emphasized the complex ways in which altered mortality and fertility patterns not only change the population pyramid into an onion or column, and eventually might create an inverted pyramid, but also change the generational structures of families and life course patterns within them (Bengtson, 2001;Gee, 1987;Leopold & Skopek, 2015;Murphy, 2011, Uhlenberg, 2004). Verdery (2015) concludes that "the demographic transition is also a kinship transition" (p. 466).…”

Section: Interdependence and Patterns Of Demographic Changementioning

confidence: 99%

How demographic patterns and social policies shape interdependence among lives in the family realm

Dykstra

Hägestad

2016

Population Horizons

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Our starting point is that a social psychological approach dominates the literature on interdependent or "linked" lives (Elder, 1994). We argue that interdependence is not only social-psychological, but is also structured on a macro-level. More specifically, we illustrate ways in which demographic change, such as increased co-longevity, creates different opportunities for interdependence for men and women. In addition, we draw attention to the role of national policies, distinguishing ways in which legislation mandates generational interdependence (e.g., legal obligations to provide financial support), blocks generational interdependence (e.g., grandparents not granted the right to raise grandchildren when parents cannot provide adequate care; migration laws not granting temporary visits to enable the provision of care), generates generational interdependence (e.g., daddy quota), and lightens generational interdependence (e.g., less reliance on grandparental care in Northern and Western Europe due to public support to parents of young children). We pay specific attention to childless men and women, questioning the primacy assigned to kinship ties in health care and long-term support policies. Gender receives consistent consideration throughout the paper.

show abstract

Long‐Term Effects of the Demographic Transition on Family and Kinship Networks in Britain

Abstract: P o P u l at i o n a n d d e v e l o P m e n t r e v i e w 3 7 ( S u P P l e m e n t ) : 5 5 -8 0 ( 2 0 1 1 ) 5 5

Cited by 90 publications

References 30 publications

Projections of white and black older adults without living kin in the United States, 2015 to 2060

Projections of white and black older adults without living kin in the United States, 2015 to 2060

Healthy Grandparenthood: How Long Is It, and How Has It Changed?

How demographic patterns and social policies shape interdependence among lives in the family realm

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About