Socioeconomic Differentials in Mortality by Cause of Death

Further analyses of the effects of practice, dropout, sex, socio-economic advantage, and recruitment cohort differences during the University of Manchester longitudinal study of cognitive change in old age

“…However, in this analysis, because no interactions between the effects of demographic factors and age were found there is no evidence that any of these factors affect rates of change. This is unexpected because other analyses of this data set have found that cognitive decline accelerates with approach to death or withdrawal from the study (Rabbitt, Lunn, & Wong, 2005, 2008a, 2008bRabbitt, Watson, Donlan, Bent, & McInnes, 1994), and studies from other laboratories find that female sex and socio-economic advantage reduce risk of mortality (e.g., Nagi & Stockwell, 1973) and that health is associated with cognitive impairment in later life (e.g., Houx, 1991;Van Boxtel et al, 1998). Thus since socio-economic advantage maintains better health we should expect it to slow cognitive decline.…”

Environments, People, and Health

“…In a comprehensive review of 30 studies on this issue, Antonovsky noted the consistency of this finding since the twelfth century when data on this question was first organized (64). These observations have been made throughout the world, regardless of whether the dominant causes of death and disability were attributed to infectious or noninfectious diseases (65)(66)(67). In a recent massive nationwide study of mortality in the United States, Kitagawa & Hauser(68) fo und that mortality rates varied dramatically among both men and women, whether studied in relation to education, income or occupation: the lower the socioeconomic level, the higher the death rate.…”

Mental health and public health: Strengthening a working relationship

“…Thus, their health is reflective of social arrangements. For example, the hierarchical distribution of goods, money, power and status is usually inversely correlated with health (Lindheim andSyme, 1983, Nagi andStockwell, 1973;Kitagawa and Hauser, 1973). The association of social class and mental illness must be understood, at least in part, in these terms.…”