Investigating Health Trajectories over the Life Course and Across Generations
A Longitudinal Analysis of the Transmission of Health and Socioeconomic Inequality from Parents to Their Adult Children
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Overview
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Studies
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Progress
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Project Team
It is well understood that socioeconomic status is positively associated with health, and that disadvantaged social circumstances in childhood can set individuals on pathways that result in the accumulation of further disadvantages that lead to poorer health over time. However, this body of work treats health inequality as a process that operates within the span of the individual life course, overlooking the transmission of health inequality across generations within families. We understand little about the process through which health inequality is passed along through families beyond that childhood social contexts, such as poverty, are important. In part, this oversight is related to the methodological challenges associated with assessing the intergenerational transmission of inequality, as well as the lack of longitudinal data that follow both children and their parents across a significant portion of their lives. In this study, we will use a unique and relatively unexplored intergenerational component of the U.S. Panel Study of Income Dynamics, which began in 1968 and continues to follow original sample members and their adult children as they form their own households. Using quantitative methods, such as latent class analysis, we will examine (1) the long term consequences of disadvantaged childhood circumstances; (2) the relationship between adult social and economic resources and health; and (3) the intergenerational transmission of health risk and health behaviours. We anticipate the findings from this work will further our understanding of the mechanisms through which inequalities in health are perpetuated or alleviated across the life course and across generations. Moreover our findings relate directly to health and social policies targeted at reducing health disparities by investing in early life inputs. Understanding why health trajectories within and between families differ is important for mapping how inequalities are perpetuated and can be reduced.
Funding
2012-2015 Canadian Institutes of Health Research Operating Grant: Advancing Theoretical and Methodological Innovations in Health Research, Value: $199,728
Principal Investigator
Andrea Willson, Ph.D.
Sociology, Faculty of Social Science
The University of Western Ontario
Kim Shuey, Ph.D.
Sociology, Faculty of Social Science
The University of Western Ontario
Co-investigators
Rachel Margolis, Ph.D.
Sociology, Faculty of Social Science
The University of Western Ontario
Laurie Corna, Ph.D.
Social Science, Health & Medicine, Faculty of Social Science & Public Policy
King's College London
This project makes use of the following survey data:
Panel Study of Income Dynamics, public use dataset. Produced and distributed by the Institute for Social Research, Survey Research Center, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, U.S.A. http://psidonline.isr.umich.edu/
Papers and Publications
Conference Papers
(2012) Kim Shuey and Andrea Willson, "The Long-Term Effects of Childhood Socioeconomic Disadvantage on Health Inequality" presented at the Annual Meeting of the Canadian Sociological Association, Waterloo, ON, May 2012.
(2010) Andrea Willson and Kim Shuey, "A Longitudinal Examination of the Intergenerational Transmission of Health Inequality" presented at the Society for Longitudinal and Life Course Studies Conference, Cambridge, UK, September 2010.
(2010) Kim Shuey and Andrea Willson, "Integrating Cumulative Advantage Theory and the Intergenerational Transmission of Inequality to Understand Health Risk Trajectories" presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association, Atlanta, August 2010.
Invited Presentations
(2011) "The Link Between Childhood Adversity and Adult Health Risk Trajectories" McGill Social Statistics Speaker Series, October 2011.
Principal Investigator:
Andrea Willson, Associate Professor

- Social inequality over the life course;
- Aging and the life course;
- Health effects of socioeconomic status across generations;
- Quantitative research
SSC 5423
519-661-2111 x85132
willson@uwo.ca
Faculty Profile
Kim Shuey, Associate Professor

- Health and disability across the life course;
- Transmission of health across generations;
- Precarious employment, work and health;
- Environmental sociology.
SSC 5426
519-661-2111 x85135
kshuey@uwo.ca
Faculty Profile
Co-Investigators:
Rachel Margolis, Associate Professor
Undergraduate Chair, Department of Sociology

- Demography;
- Social inequality;
- Family change;
- Aging
SSC 5326
519-661-2111 x82850
rachel.margolis@uwo.ca
Faculty Profile
Laurie Corna, Lecturer, King's College London
Lecturer at USI Università della Svizzera italiana / University of Lugano
CIHR Post-Doctoral Fellow, Sociology, The University of Western Ontario
- social inequalities in health; community and public health
- social gerontology; life course influences on health and well-being in later life
- quantitative research methods
0207 848 7115
laurie.corna@kcl.ac.uk