Living with parents or grandparents increases social capital and survival: 2014 General Social Survey-National Death Index

Peter Muennig, Boshen Jiao, Elizabeth Singer

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

30 Scopus citations

Abstract

Introduction After nearly a century-long trend toward single-family living arrangements, people in wealthy nations are increasingly living in multi-generational households. Multi-generational living arrangements can, in theory, increase psychological, social, and financial capital—factors associated with improvements in health and longevity. Methods We conducted a survival analysis using the 2014 General Social Survey-National Death Index, a prospective multi-year survey. We explored whether single generational living arrangements were associated with a higher risk of mortality than multi-generational living arrangements. Results We explored this association for different groups (e.g., the foreign-born and those with high self-reported stress in family relationships). Healthy subjects who live in two-generation households were found to have lower premature mortality (hazard ratio 0.9, 95% confidence interval = 0.82, 0.99). Otherwise, we found little evidence that living arrangements matter for the respondents’ risk of premature mortality. Conclusions Healthy people living in two-generation households have longer survival than healthy people living on their own.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)71-75
Number of pages5
JournalSSM - Population Health
Volume4
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 2018

Keywords

  • Immigrant Health
  • Social capital and health
  • Survival

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