Scientific Presentations
LabTalks@SocialDemography
Department Social Demography
Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR), Rostock, Germany, February 18, 2025
1:00 PM: Talk with Carla Rowold - Concepts and consequences of family complexity
Abstract
Empirical research has shown a negative association between parental union dissolution or family transitions and children’s educational outcomes. However, there is a tension regarding the most appropriate measures to reflect family complexity, with recent studies calling for more comprehensive approaches. I’ll present two preliminary studies that address these issue and that are closely related:
In the first study, drawing on different theoretical perspectives and previous empirical evidence, we apply dynamic sequence complexity indices to conceptualize different measures of family complexity and explore their evolution over children’s school careers. Such measures go beyond the mere number of transitions commonly applied in previous research and cover concepts such as unpredictability and theoretically informed disadvantage. We then examine the relationship between the family complexity proxies and English and math test scores using fixed-effects regression models to assess which family complexity measures affect English and math test scores. We use data from the UK Household Longitudinal Study (UKHLS) linked to the National Pupil Database (NPD) to analyze the family life courses of children’s parents and the educational outcomes of children.
In the second study, we aim to address recent calls in literature for including different family environments. Using Finnish population data, we address this need by applying the conceptualization of family complexity from study 1 to five distinct dimensions of family lives: parental partnership status, sibling complexity, parental family structure, other adult’s household structure, and residential moves. This enables us to disentangle how distinct concepts of family complexity differ across different dimensions of family lives across the childhood. Preliminary results show that family complexity differ largely across socioeconomic background of children, and the temporal dynamics and levels of the gaps differ across family dimensions and complexity measures.
1:45 PM: Talk with Peng Li - The Nexus of Diabetes Mellitus and Cancers Risks in General Population: A Comprehensive Population-Based Cohort Analyses of UK and Finland
Abstract
Diabetes mellitus (DM) is reported as risk factor for many different cancer types, while the evidences on population level is inadequate. This study aimed at evaluating the associations between DM and full spectrum of cancers in general population using population-based perspective cohort studies from UK and Finland. Totally 457,256 participants in UK Biobank were included and followed-up until mid-2023 for new cancer diagnoses. Totally 3,290,884 Finnish residents, aged 30+ at year 2010 were included and followed-up until 2021 for new cancer diagnoses. Hazard ratios (HR) of developing cancers between samples with and without DM were estimated via Cox proportional hazard ratio regression models adjusted with demographic and socioeconomic covariates, individual lifestyle risk factors and health conditions. Totally 78,000 and 270,000 cancer cases were diagnosed during follow-up period in UKB and Finland. Diabetic individuals demonstrated heightened risks over all cancers (UKB: HR 1.07 95% confidence interval CI: 1.04–1.10; FNR: HR 1.18, %95 CI 1.17–1.19). DM was associated with elevated risks of several cancer types in both UK and Finland, especially for gastrointestinal cancers, such as liver cancer, pancreatic cancer and colon cancer. Further investigations on the onset ages and types of DM and its causal effects on different histological types cancers were needed.
LabTalk, February, 18th from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. (Rostock time)