Path Analysis of Socioeconomic Correlates of County Infant Mortality Rates

Abstract

Relationships between selected socioeconomic characteristics of counties and infant mortality rates are examined. There are two research objectives: to determine the extent to which low family income, low education, sound housing, and the percentage of blacks "directly" and "jointly" relate to neonatal and postneonatal mortality rates; and to determine the degree to which a zero-order correlation between a given socioeconomic measure and general infant mortality is transmitted by neonatal and postneonatal mortality rates, respectively. Data corresponding to 2237 counties in the United States are analyzed by path analysis. Results show that the percentage of blacks and low education are two variables which have appreciable direct effects on both components of infant mortality. These two factors are also responsible in large measure for gross associations between low family income, sound housing, and rates of infant loss. On the basis of this study it is estimated that approximately two-thirds of the zero-order correlation between a given county measure of socioeconomic status and infant mortality occurs through the postneonatal component. Implications of these findings are discussed.

Segregation, Poverty, and Empowerment: Health Consequences for African Americans

“…Future research is needed to examine the impact of other correlates of aggregate infant mortality on the black-white differential. Examples of these variables include access to medical technology, quality of housing (Brooks 1975), overcrowded living conditions (Schwirian and Lacreca 1971), quality of medical care under Medicaid (Brooks 1978), and exposure to air pollu tion (Joyce, Grossman, andGoldman 1989)-Corman andGrossman (1985) concluded that the availability of abortion, of neonatal intensive care units, education, Medicaid, community health service projects, ma ternal nutrition programs, and family planning services has an impact on neonatal mortality rates at the county level. However, the topic of black-white infant mortality differences has seldom been a primary con cern in published reports.…”

“…Empirical examples of the relationship between them can be found as early as the first decade of the twentieth century (Newsholme 1910). The sheer volume of research supporting a link between poverty or low socioeconomic status and infant mortality is impressive (LaVeist 1990;Paneth et al 1982;Gortmaker 1979;Brooks 1975;Stockwell 1962). In fact, one author (Anderson 1958) pronounced any further research on the relationship between poverty and infant mortality to be "a waste of time, money and effort, because the gross relationship [had] been estab lished conclusively enough.…”

Path Analysis of Biomarkers of Exposure and Early Biological Effects among Coke-Oven Workers Exposed to Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons

“…Path analysis was first developed by Sewall Wright in the 1920s for the use in quantitative genetic studies and later was gradually adopted by social sciences, ecology, psychology, and economics (17,18), as well as health sciences (19,20), in which the interaction mechanisms were not well understood in the presence of known risk factors, such as epidemiologic studies of chronic illness. The path analysis helps understand comparative strengths of direct and indirect relationships among a set of variables of interest.…”

Changing Regional Inequalities in North Carolina, 1928–82

“…Especially emphasized has been the relationship between the mother's education and the compatibili-ty of her role with simultaneous childrearing (Ware 1984). Also important are unemployment, poverty and other economic conditions which can exacerbate the prevalence of infant mortality (Brooks 1975(Brooks ,1980Gortmaker 1979). Crowded and unclean housing increases the exposure to infectious disease and accidents, both of which can jeopardize the fragile life of the newborn.…”