No abstract

This study employs data from the 1988 National Survey of Hispanic Elderly People to examine the impact of age at migration and social contacts on the self-assessed health, functional disability, and life satisfaction of elderly Cuban Americans, Mexican Americans, and Puerto Ricans in the United States. The results indicate that the difficulties associated with immigration late in life undermine an older person's morale and interfere with the ability to perform basic activities of daily living. Although children are important sources of social support for all Hispanic groups, our findings also reveal important group differences in the use of other community social resources and their impact on health. Older Cuban Americans, in particular, appear to benefit from residence in ethnic enclaves in which they have largely duplicated their culture of origin.

Protracted morbidity that accompanies increases in life expectancy has serious implications for the physical, social, and economic well-being of older individuals and their families, as well as for health and long-term care policy.

Research shows that social engagement reduces the probability of cognitive decline in late life. The purpose of this study was to test whether religious attendance, a major source of social engagement for many older individuals, is associated with slower rates of cognitive decline among older Mexican Americans. Using four waves of data collected from a sample of 3,050 older Mexican-origin individuals, we estimated a series of linear growth curve models to assess the effects of religious attendance on cognitive functioning trajectories. We used the Mini-Mental State Examination to measure cognitive functioning. Our central finding is that religious attendance is associated with slower rates of cognitive decline among older Mexican Americans. Specifically, respondents who attend church monthly, weekly, and more than weekly tend to exhibit slower rates of cognitive decline than those who do not attend church.

Although some research suggests that the healthy immigrant effect extends to cognitive functioning, it is unclear whether this general pattern varies according to gender. We use six waves of data collected from the original cohort of the Hispanic Established Populations for the Epidemiologic Study of the Elderly to estimate a series of linear growth curve models to assess variations in cognitive functioning trajectories by nativity status and age at migration to the U.S.A. among women and men. Our results show, among women and men, no differences in baseline cognitive status (intercepts) between early- (before age 20) and late-life (50 and older) immigrants and U.S.-born individuals of Mexican-origin. We also find, among women and men, that middle-life (between the ages of 20 and 49) immigrants tend to exhibit higher levels of baseline cognitive functioning than the U.S.-born. Our growth curve analyses suggest that the cognitive functioning trajectories (slopes) of women do not vary according to nativity status and age at migration. The cognitive functioning trajectories of early- and late-life immigrant men are also similar to those of U.S.-born men; however, those men who migrated in middle-life tend to exhibit slower rates of cognitive decline. A statistically significant interaction term suggests that the pattern for middle-life migration is more pronounced for men (or attenuated for women). In other words, although women and men who migrated in middle-life exhibit higher levels of baseline cognitive functioning, immigrant men tend to maintain this advantage for a longer period of time. Taken together, these patterns confirm that gender is an important conditioning factor in the association between immigrant status and cognitive functioning.