Influence Of Childhood Factors On Health Impairment In Older Adults

In the social context of population aging and the policy context of healthy China and healthy aging,as important organizers and influencers of families,children have a significant impact on the health status of the elderly population,and it is of practical significance to investigate the influence of children’s factors on the progress of health impairment in the elderly population to implement the policy of healthy aging and healthy China.In this study,based on the data from the China Elderly Health Influencing Factor Tracking Survey(CLHLS)from 2014 to 2018,a health impairment progression model and a health state transfer model were constructed to investigate the health impairment progression patterns and expected survival times of older adults,and to compare the differences in health impairment progression and expected survival times in each state among older adults affected by different child factors.Among the child factors,the number of children,the number of children who go out,the number of children who visit frequently,the number of children who contact frequently,and the financial support provided by children were included,and finally regression analysis was conducted to obtain the effects of the number of children,the number of children who go out,the financial support provided by children,the number of children who visit frequently,and the number of children who contact frequently on the probability of health state transfer and the expected survival time and life expectancy of the elderly relationships.It was found that(1)older people with more children are more likely to shift to a poorer health state and have shorter expected survival time and life expectancy in each state,the possible reasons for this are that the more children they have,the more mental and physical effort the older people put in when they are young,and the shifting of caregiving responsibilities between children,leading to(2)The number of children outside the home increases the probability of survival of the elderly,decreases the probability of going from mild to severe disability,and the expected survival time and life expectancy of the elderly in the healthy state and mild disability state are significantly longer,which may be due to the fact that the children outside the home can better understand the difficulties of their parents and increase their care and attention to their elderly parents,and that the children who work outside the home are more concerned about the elderly parents left behind.(3)financial support provided by children has a significant positive effect on the probability of healthy to severely disabled,which may be due to children providing material but less physical care;(4)older adults with more children visiting have a higher probability of moving from each health state to death,and the higher the number of children visiting or contacting frequently,the shorter the expected survival time and life expectancy in each state.The higher the number of children who visit or contact regularly,the shorter the expected survival time and life expectancy in each state,which may be explained by the fact that older adults are already in poorer health,causing an increase in child visits and contact.In the context of deepening aging,the inverse relationship between the number of children and the progress of health impairment of the elderly and the positive relationship between children’s financial support are suggested:(1)to shape the culture of filial piety;(2)to improve the old-age security system;(3)to innovate the payment method of long-term care insurance.