IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v60y2005i3p457-470.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Determinants of old-age mortality in Taiwan

Author

Listed:
  • Zimmer, Zachary
  • Martin, Linda G.
  • Lin, Hui-Sheng

Abstract

Relationships among socio-demographic characteristics, general assessments of health, and old-age mortality have been well established in developed countries. There is also increasing focus on the connection between early-life experiences and late-life health. This study tests these and other associations using representative survey data from Taiwan. Survey data on the 60 and over population (N=4049) in 1989, 1993, and 1996 are linked to 1989-1999 data from a national death registry. Survival is modeled using Gompertz regression and both fixed and time-varying covariates. Possible effects of Taiwan's Universal Health Insurance Program are tested by coding observations as pre- or post-insurance. Some results replicate findings from developed countries; others are new. Contemporaneous education effects on survival are attenuated after introducing some indicators of health from a previous period. Functional and global assessments of health have stronger associations with survival than reports of other health-related characteristics. Mainlanders have higher survival than others. Increases in survival over the 1990s were concentrated among those with the greatest number and severity of functional limitations. This pattern may be an indication of better access to health care or changes in longer-run, but unmeasured, determinants of old-age mortality.

Suggested Citation

  • Zimmer, Zachary & Martin, Linda G. & Lin, Hui-Sheng, 2005. "Determinants of old-age mortality in Taiwan," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 60(3), pages 457-470, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:60:y:2005:i:3:p:457-470
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277-9536(04)00273-4
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jersey Liang & Joan Bennett & Neal Krause & Erika Kobayashi & Hyekyung Kim & J. Winchester Brown & Hiroko Akiyama & Hidehiro Sugisawa & Arvind Jain, 2002. "Old Age Mortality in Japan," The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, The Gerontological Society of America, vol. 57(5), pages 294-307.
    2. Yuanreng Hu & Noreen Goldman, 1990. "Mortality Differentials by Marital Status: An International Comparison," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 27(2), pages 233-250, May.
    3. Jersey Liang & John F. McCarthy & Arvind Jain & Neal Krause & Joan M. Bennett & Shengzu Gu, 2000. "Socioeconomic Gradient in Old Age Mortality in Wuhan, China," The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, The Gerontological Society of America, vol. 55(4), pages 222-233.
    4. Zachary Zimmer & Xian Liu & Albert Hermalin & Yi-Li Chuang, 1998. "Educational attainment and transitions in functional status among older Taiwanese," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 35(3), pages 361-375, August.
    5. Preston, Samuel H. & Hill, Mark E. & Drevenstedt, Greg L., 1998. "Childhood conditions that predict survival to advanced ages among African-Americans," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 47(9), pages 1231-1246, November.
    6. David Melzer & Grant Izmirlian & Suzanne G. Leveille & Jack M. Guralnik, 2001. "Educational Differences in the Prevalence of Mobility Disability in Old Age," The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, The Gerontological Society of America, vol. 56(5), pages 294-301.
    7. Chiang, Tung-liang, 1997. "Taiwan's 1995 health care reform," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 225-239, March.
    8. Mostafa, Golam & van Ginneken, Jeroen K., 2000. "Trends in and determinants of mortality in the elderly population of Matlab, Bangladesh," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 50(6), pages 763-771, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Shu-Hsi Ho, 2015. "A comparative assessment of emergency medicine between the widowers and widows among the elderly in Taiwan," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 35(3), pages 1795-1808.
    2. Wen-Shai Hung & Shu-Hsi Ho, 2008. "Survival Analysis for Unobserved Heterogeneity on Estimated Mortality in Taiwan," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 9(25), pages 1-10.
    3. Gersten, Omer, 2008. "Neuroendocrine biomarkers, social relations, and the cumulative costs of stress in Taiwan," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(3), pages 507-519, February.
    4. Lee, Miaw-Chwen & Huang, Nicole, 2015. "Changes in self-perceived economic satisfaction and mortality at old ages: Evidence from a survey of middle-aged and elderly adults in Taiwan," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 1-8.
    5. Sei J Lee & W John Boscardin & Katharine A Kirby & Kenneth E Covinsky, 2014. "Individualizing Life Expectancy Estimates for Older Adults Using the Gompertz Law of Human Mortality," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 9(9), pages 1-8, September.
    6. repec:ebl:ecbull:v:9:y:2008:i:25:p:1-10 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Dana A. Glei & Noreen Goldman & Germán Rodríguez & Maxine Weinstein, 2014. "Beyond Self-Reports: Changes in Biomarkers as Predictors of Mortality," Population and Development Review, The Population Council, Inc., vol. 40(2), pages 331-360, June.
    8. Lo, Te-Fen & Hsieh, Chee-Ruey, 2013. "Dynamic profile of health investment and the evolution of elderly health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 134-142.
    9. Sharifah Haron & Deanna Sharpe & Jariah Masud & Mohamed Abdel-Ghany, 2010. "Health Divide: Economic and Demographic Factors Associated with Self-Reported Health Among Older Malaysians," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 31(3), pages 328-337, September.
    10. Hung, Jung-Hua & Chang, Li, 2008. "Has cost containment after the National Health Insurance system been successful: Determinants of Taiwan hospital costs," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 85(3), pages 321-335, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sibai, Abla M. & Yount, Kathryn M. & Fletcher, Astrid, 2007. "Marital status, intergenerational co-residence and cardiovascular and all-cause mortality among middle-aged and older men and women during wartime in Beirut: Gains and liabilities," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 64-76, January.
    2. Manzoli, Lamberto & Villari, Paolo & M Pirone, Giovanni & Boccia, Antonio, 2007. "Marital status and mortality in the elderly: A systematic review and meta-analysis," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 77-94, January.
    3. Robert G. Wood & Brian Goesling & Sarah Avellar, "undated". "The Effects of Marriage on Health: A Synthesis of Recent Research Evidence," Mathematica Policy Research Reports d69bf47785bc4154a4e184aa5, Mathematica Policy Research.
    4. Barik, Debasis & Desai, Sonalde & Vanneman, Reeve, 2018. "Economic Status and Adult Mortality in India: Is the Relationship Sensitive to Choice of Indicators?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 176-187.
    5. Danan Gu & Yi Zeng, 2004. "Sociodemographic Effects on the Onset and Recovery of ADL Disability among Chinese Oldest-old," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 11(1), pages 1-42.
    6. Ming Wen & Danan Gu, 2011. "The Effects of Childhood, Adult, and Community Socioeconomic Conditions on Health and Mortality among Older Adults in China," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 48(1), pages 153-181, February.
    7. Zachary Zimmer & Linda Martin & Mary Ofstedal & Yi-Li Chuang, 2007. "Education of adult children and mortality of their elderly parents in Taiwan," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 44(2), pages 289-305, May.
    8. Emma Zang & Cameron Campbell, 2018. "Males’ Later-Life Mortality Consequences of Coresidence With Paternal Grandparents: Evidence From Northeast China, 1789–1909," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 55(2), pages 435-457, April.
    9. Zimmer, Zachary & Wen, Ming & Kaneda, Toshiko, 2010. "A multi-level analysis of urban/rural and socioeconomic differences in functional health status transition among older Chinese," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(3), pages 559-567, August.
    10. Guven, Cahit & Senik, Claudia & Stichnoth, Holger, 2012. "You can’t be happier than your wife. Happiness gaps and divorce," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 82(1), pages 110-130.
    11. Subramanian, S.V. & Elwert, Felix & Christakis, Nicholas, 2008. "Widowhood and mortality among the elderly: The modifying role of neighborhood concentration of widowed individuals," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(4), pages 873-884, February.
    12. Shen, Ke & Zeng, Yi, 2014. "Direct and indirect effects of childhood conditions on survival and health among male and female elderly in China," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 207-214.
    13. Bengtsson, Tommy & Broström, Göran, 2009. "Do conditions in early life affect old-age mortality directly and indirectly? Evidence from 19th-century rural Sweden," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(9), pages 1583-1590, May.
    14. Reto Schumacher & Sarah Vilpert, 2011. "Gender differences in social mortality differentials in Switzerland (1990-2005)," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 25(8), pages 285-310.
    15. Schultz, T. Paul, 2010. "Population and Health Policies," Handbook of Development Economics, in: Dani Rodrik & Mark Rosenzweig (ed.), Handbook of Development Economics, edition 1, volume 5, chapter 0, pages 4785-4881, Elsevier.
    16. Haan, Peter & Prowse, Victoria, 2014. "Longevity, life-cycle behavior and pension reform," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 178(P3), pages 582-601.
    17. Nawid Siassi, 2019. "Inequality and the Marriage Gap," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 31, pages 160-181, January.
    18. Ana C. Gómez-Ugarte & Víctor M. García-Guerrero, 2023. "Inequality Crossroads of Mortality: Socioeconomic Disparities in Life Expectancy and Life Span in Mexico Between 1990 and 2015," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 42(4), pages 1-22, August.
    19. ZHONG, Hai, 2015. "An over time analysis on the mechanisms behind the education–health gradients in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 135-149.
    20. Fu, Hwai-Hui & Tsai, Hsien-Tang & Lin, Ching-Wei & Wei, Duan, 2004. "Application of a single sampling plan for auditing medical-claim payments made by Taiwan National Health Insurance," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 70(2), pages 185-195, November.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:60:y:2005:i:3:p:457-470. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.