Conference Agenda

A rich literature documents that bereavement, having lost a significant person through death, is associated with excess risk of mortality and decrements in physical and mental health. The impact of bereavement is strongest early after the loss but can lead to long-lasting disorders. The reach of the consequences of bereavement tends also to differ between socio-demographic and socioeconomic groups. Despite their relevance, the role of these factors as mediators and moderators of the association between spousal death and own mortality risk remains under-researched. Using Italian register data from the National Institute of Social Security (INPS) and stepwise logistic regression, the study investigates the relationship between the experience of bereavement and mortality risk among Italian old-age pensioners. The study explores the role of gender, age, region of residence, and socioeconomic heterogeneities in the mortality risk of widowed pensioners. Furthermore, we analyze how the mortality risk varies depending on the time since bereavement.

It is well established that childhood family conditions play an important role in shaping survival

chances around birth and in adult life. Still, it is an open question whether the influence of family of

origin on old age mortality patterns holds in population-wide settings, especially in low mortality

contemporary countries. To the best of our knowledge, ours is the first study to explore similarity in

sibling mortality among seniors at the population level in the United States, a low mortality but high

inequality country. We combine data from multiple US administrative data sources, including the

1920 and 1940 census, and CenSoc DMF dataset, which includes death records from the Social

Security Administration Death Master File. We compare sibling dyads and matched dyads who share

parental and background characteristics following the methodology suggested in Raab et al. (2014)

for life course trajectories. Findings suggest that siblings’ lifespans are more similar than that of

matched-but-unrelated dyads, with persisting lifespan correlations at older ages. We find no evidence

of socio-economic differentials in sibling correlations by father’s occupation, rural or urban setting,

and county of residency in childhood.

Information on the behavior of the force of mortality at old ages is essential to shed light on human ageing and longevity, and the mechanisms of mortality improvements. Several studies demonstrated that the Gamma-Gompertz model adequately captures the observed trajectory of human mortality at old ages. Nevertheless, the theoretical predictions of the Gamma-Gompertz model does not fully capture all the qualitative characteristic of the observations at the extreme ages. This study explores possible extensions of the Gamma-Gompertz model able to fully capture the behavior of the mortality trajectory at old and extreme ages. The general aim is to confront empirical data with the estimated mortality trajectories derived from different theories of human ageing and mechanisms of mortality improvement.

The relationship between partnership status and mortality is usually examined in the context of the individual's own socioeconomic status (SES). However, it is important to consider the socioeconomic resources of a current partner or, even more so, those of a previous partner. This study explores how the mortality differences by partnership status depend on their own level of education and the ones of their (ex-)partners, using accelerated failure time models divided by sex. We use Finnish full-population data on individuals aged 50 or above between 1987 and 2022 (N=2,677,800). Our preliminary findings show the presence of differences in mortality by partnership status. Never-married individuals have the highest mortality risk, followed by divorced ones and those with a dissolved cohabitation. Among previously partnered individuals, men had the highest mortality and the largest socioeconomic differences compared to women. Moreover, not only previously partnered individuals present a significant disadvantage in mortality if they were low-educated, but also if they were highly educated but with low-educated ex-partners.

Spousal loss is a critical life event associated with intense grief. Previous research assessed the mental health consequences in select samples and single country settings, but comparative research on how the impact of spousal death unfolds over time is lacking. We assess 1) the consequences of widowhood for mental health across European countries in the short-term, i.e. the year of spousal death, and medium-term, i.e. up to five years following bereavement and 2) how individual resources and country contexts moderate the consequences of widowhood for mental health? We use SHARE data and between-within random effects regressions to estimate within-individual change in depressive symptoms. We find that widowhood increases depressive symptoms across all European countries up to two years following bereavement. However, we also find considerable cross-national differences, suggesting country contexts play a role in moderating the link between spousal loss and mental health.