De Neve, J-W; Harling, G; (2017) Offspring schooling associated with increased parental survival in rural KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Social Science & Medicine , 176 pp. 149-157. 10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.01.015.

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Abstract

BACKGROUND: Investing in offspring's human capital has been suggested as an effective strategy for parents to improve their living conditions at older ages. A few studies have assessed the role of children's schooling in parental survival in high-income countries, but none have considered lower-resource settings with limited public wealth transfers and high adult mortality. METHODS: We followed 17,789 parents between January 2003 and August 2015 in a large population-based open cohort in rural KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. We used Cox proportional hazards models to investigate the association between offspring's schooling and time to parental death. We assessed the association separately by parental sex and for four cause of death groups. RESULTS: A one year increase in offspring's schooling attainment was associated with a 5% decline in the hazard of maternal death (adjusted Hazard Ratio [aHR]: 0.95, 95%CI: 0.94-0.97) and a 6% decline in the hazard of paternal death (aHR: 0.94, 95%CI: 0.92-0.96), adjusting for a wide range of demographic and socio-economic variables of the parent and their children. Among mothers, the association was strongest for communicable, maternal, perinatal and nutritional conditions (aHR: 0.87, 95%CI: 0.82-0.92) and AIDS and tuberculosis (aHR: 0.92, 95%CI: 0.89-0.96), and weakest for injuries. Among fathers, the association was strongest for injuries (aHR: 0.87, 95%CI: 0.79-0.95) and AIDS and tuberculosis (aHR: 0.92, 95%CI: 0.89-0.96), and weakest for non-communicable diseases. CONCLUSION: Higher levels of schooling in offspring are associated with increased parental survival in rural South Africa, particularly for mothers at risk of communicable disease mortality and fathers at risk of injury mortality. Offspring's human capital may be an important factor for health disparities, particularly in lower-resource settings.

Type:	Article
Title:	Offspring schooling associated with increased parental survival in rural KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa
Location:	England
Open access status:	An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI:	10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.01.015
Publisher version:	http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.01.015
Language:	English
Additional information:	© 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Keywords:	Longitudinal, Offspring schooling, South Africa, Survival
UCL classification:	UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Institute for Global Health
URI:	https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1556351

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• Offspring schooling associated with increased parental survival in rural KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. (deposited 05 Feb 2017 02:45)
  • Offspring schooling associated with increased parental survival in rural KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. (deposited 18 May 2017 10:54) [Currently Displayed]

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