SSRI/DuPRI Seminar Series ~ Redirected Lives: The Role of Women's Health in the Intergenerational Transmission of Socioeconomic Status

ABSTRACT: Drawing on cumulative theory, this study examines whether health limitations over the life course mediate the effects of parent socioeconomic status on the socioeconomic status of women. Using merged data from the National Longitudinal Surveys of Mature Women and Young Women (n=1848), we estimate a multiple process growth curve model that allows us to model a chain of risk from early life to middle age. Results show that the effects of parent socioeconomic status on women's trajectories of poverty are mediated through early life health limitations, young adult health limitations, and trajectories of health limitations in adulthood, but that the health effects are further mediated through trajectories of employment. The results point to the complex interplay of health and poverty over time and the need to contextualize both processes. Seminar #4410