November 18, 2015 | News | Suessmilch Lecture

Trends in the association between educational attainment and U.S. adult mortality: Bringing historical context back in

On November 24, 2015, Mark D. Hayward of the University of Texas Austin will give a lecture at the MPIDR. He will deal with the question about the growing importance of advanced education in the US for improving adult life expectancy.

About the talk
Has the shape of the association between educational attainment and U.S. adult mortality changed in recent decades? If so, is it changing consistently across demographic groups? This paper develops the argument that societal technological and institutional changes have had profound effects on the importance of educational attainment – particularly advanced education – in the U.S. adult population for garnering health advantages and that these changes should be reflected in changes in the functional form of the association between educational attainment and mortality. We review the historical evidence on the changing functional form of the association between educational attainment and adult mortality, drawing from studies based in the United States, to assess whether documented changes in the functional form are consistent with our argument about the role of technological change in influencing the association. We also provide an updated analysis of these functional form patterns and trends, contrasting data from the early 21st Century with data from the late 20th Century. Finally, changes in life expectancy within educational groups are used to identify when in the life course changes in functional forms resulted in gains and losses in life expectancy between 1990-2010. This updated evidence suggests that the shape of the association between educational attainment and U.S. adult mortality appears to be reflecting lower and lower adult mortality for very highly educated Americans compared to their low-educated counterparts in the 21st Century. The most educated Americans experienced substantial gains in life expectancy, spanning from early to late adulthood. Less educated Americans, however, lost life expectancy, especially in middle adulthood. We draw on this review and updated evidence to reflect on the question whether education’s association with adult mortality has become increasingly causal in recent decades, why, and the potential research and policy implications of these changes.

About the person
Mark Hayward is a professor of sociology, Centennial Commission Professor in the Liberal Arts, and a faculty research associate of the Population Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin. His primary research addresses how life course exposures and events influence the morbidity and mortality experiences of the adult population. Most recently, he has been investigating the fundamental inequalities in adult mortality in the United States arising from educational experience, differences in these associations by race and gender, and the growing educational inequality in mortality.

Time and Venue
Tuesday, November 24, 4 p.m., in the Institute's Auditorium