Measuring the Speed of Aging across Population Subgroups
People in different subgroups age at different rates. Surveys containing biomarkers can be used to assess these subgroup differences. We illustrate this using hand-grip strength to produce an easily interpretable, physical-based measure that allows us to compare characteristic-based ages across educ...
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ndltd-VIENNA-oai-epub.wu-wien.ac.at-57922018-12-08T05:58:01Z Measuring the Speed of Aging across Population Subgroups Dowd, Jennifer Beam Sanderson, Warren Scherbov, Sergei People in different subgroups age at different rates. Surveys containing biomarkers can be used to assess these subgroup differences. We illustrate this using hand-grip strength to produce an easily interpretable, physical-based measure that allows us to compare characteristic-based ages across educational subgroups in the United States. Hand-grip strength has been shown to be a good predictor of future mortality and morbidity, and therefore a useful indicator of population aging. Data from the Health and Retirement Survey (HRS) were used. Two education subgroups were distinguished, those with less than a high school diploma and those with more education. Regressions on hand-grip strength were run for each sex and race using age and education, their interactions and other covariates as independent variables. Ages of identical mean hand-grip strength across education groups were compared for people in the age range 60 to 80. The hand-grip strength of 65 year old white males with less education was the equivalent to that of 69.6 (68.2, 70.9) year old white men with more education, indicating that the more educated men had aged more slowly. This is a constant characteristic age, as defined in the Sanderson and Scherbov article "The characteristics approach to the measurement of population aging" published 2013 in Population and Development Review. Sixty-five year old white females with less education had the same average hand-grip strength as 69.4 (68.2, 70.7) year old white women with more education. African-American women at ages 60 and 65 with more education also aged more slowly than their less educated counterparts. African American men with more education aged at about the same rate as those with less education. This paper expands the toolkit of those interested in population aging by showing how survey data can be used to measure the differential extent of aging across subpopulations. Public Library of Science 2014 Article PeerReviewed en application/pdf http://epub.wu.ac.at/5792/1/file.pdf Creative Commons: Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0096289 https://www.plos.org/ http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0096289#s5 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0096289 http://epub.wu.ac.at/5792/ |
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People in different subgroups age at different rates. Surveys containing biomarkers can be used to assess these subgroup differences. We illustrate this using hand-grip strength to produce an easily interpretable, physical-based measure that allows us to compare characteristic-based ages across educational subgroups in the United States. Hand-grip strength has been shown to be a good predictor of future mortality and morbidity, and therefore a useful indicator of population aging. Data from the Health and Retirement Survey (HRS) were used. Two education subgroups were distinguished, those with less than a high school diploma and those with more education. Regressions on hand-grip strength were run for each sex and race using age and education, their interactions and other covariates as independent variables. Ages of identical mean hand-grip strength across education groups were compared for people in the age range 60 to 80. The hand-grip strength of 65 year old white males with less education was the equivalent to that of 69.6 (68.2, 70.9) year old white men with more education, indicating that the more educated men had aged more slowly. This is a constant characteristic age, as defined in the Sanderson and Scherbov article "The characteristics approach to the measurement of population aging" published 2013 in Population and Development Review. Sixty-five year old white females with less education had the same average hand-grip strength as 69.4 (68.2, 70.7) year old white women with more education. African-American women at ages 60 and 65 with more education also aged more slowly than their less educated counterparts. African American men with more education aged at about the same rate as those with less education. This paper expands the toolkit of those interested in population aging by showing how survey data can be used to measure the differential extent of aging across subpopulations. |
author |
Dowd, Jennifer Beam Sanderson, Warren Scherbov, Sergei |
spellingShingle |
Dowd, Jennifer Beam Sanderson, Warren Scherbov, Sergei Measuring the Speed of Aging across Population Subgroups |
author_facet |
Dowd, Jennifer Beam Sanderson, Warren Scherbov, Sergei |
author_sort |
Dowd, Jennifer Beam |
title |
Measuring the Speed of Aging across Population Subgroups |
title_short |
Measuring the Speed of Aging across Population Subgroups |
title_full |
Measuring the Speed of Aging across Population Subgroups |
title_fullStr |
Measuring the Speed of Aging across Population Subgroups |
title_full_unstemmed |
Measuring the Speed of Aging across Population Subgroups |
title_sort |
measuring the speed of aging across population subgroups |
publisher |
Public Library of Science |
publishDate |
2014 |
url |
http://epub.wu.ac.at/5792/1/file.pdf http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0096289 |
work_keys_str_mv |
AT dowdjenniferbeam measuringthespeedofagingacrosspopulationsubgroups AT sandersonwarren measuringthespeedofagingacrosspopulationsubgroups AT scherbovsergei measuringthespeedofagingacrosspopulationsubgroups |
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