Laboratory

Population Health

Project

Education Disparities in Health from the Perspective of the European East-West Divide (Dissertation)

Donata Stonkute, Mikko Myrskylä, Angelo Lorenti, Joanna Mhairi Hale (University of St Andrews, School of Geography and Sustainable Development, United Kingdom)

Detailed Description

Health varies across Europe. The variations likely reflect not only underlying differences in demographic and epidemiological profiles but also in contextual settings. The most notable health differences are observed between Central and Eastern European countries on the one side and the rest of the subcontinent on the other.

This phenomenon is often referred to as the European East-West health divide. The Central and Eastern European region is particularly interesting for research on health inequality because of its history of state socialism, the early expansion of education, historically high female employment, and an atypical relationship between education and income. However, these positive factors may be undermined by the lack of progress across many health indicators. Central and Eastern European countries face challenges in reducing their cardiovascular diseases, and their age patterns of mortality substantially differ from those observed in Western countries. The Central and Eastern European thus is a focus of this project.

Based on the vast body of research literature that documents the important role played by socioeconomic position in mortality and morbidity risks, we aim to gain a deeper understanding of the extent to which education matters for health across European countries and of its reasons. The project explores health differences from the perspectives of the life course and cumulative inequality theories. Within the theoretical framework, we focus on both physical and cognitive health, differentiating the observed patterns by gender and exploring how lifespan inequality influences the educational gradient in health. In particular, we investigate the link between childhood circumstances and health behaviors, both of which contribute to the burden and onset of poor health.

We use longitudinal survey and administrative register data, apply conventional demographic methods, and introduce novel methodological approaches in studying educational disparities in the duration of healthy living (i.e., no physical health limitations, no cognitive impairments) and in studying the role that different social and contextual factors play in the differences and potential patterns emerging across European regions.

Publications

Stonkute, D.; Lorenti, A.; Spijker, J. J. A.:

Educational disparities in disability-free life expectancy across Europe: a focus on the East-West gaps from a gender perspective

MPIDR Working Paper WP-2023-028. (2023)