Double jeopardy: interaction effects of marital and poverty status on the risk of mortality

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Publication Type Journal Article
School or College College of Social & Behavioral Science
Department Economics
Creator Smith, Ken R.; Waitzman, Norman J.
Title Double jeopardy: interaction effects of marital and poverty status on the risk of mortality
Date 1994
Description The purpose of this paper is to examine the hypothesis that marital and poverty status interact in their effects on mortality risks beyond their main effects. This study examines the epidemiological bases for applying an additive rather than a multiplicative specification when testing for interaction between two discrete risk factors. We specifically predict that risks associated with being nonmarried and with being poor interact to produce mortality risks that are greater than each risk acting independently. The analysis is based on men and women who were ages 25-74 during the 1971-1975 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey I (NHANES I) and who were traced successfully in the NHANES I Epidemiologic Follow-Up Study in 1982-1984. Overall, being both poor and nonmarried places nonelderly (ages 25-64) men, but not women, at risk of mortality greater than that expected from the main effects. This study shows that for all-cause mortality, marital and poverty status interact for men but less so for women; these findings exist when interaction is assessed with either a multiplicative or an additive standard. This difference is most pronounced for poor, widowed men and (to a lesser degree) poor, divorced men. For violent/accidental deaths among men, the interaction effects are large on the basis of an additive model. Weak main and interaction effects were detected for the elderly (age 65 + ).
Type Text
Publisher Population Association of America (PAA)
Volume 31
Issue 3
First Page 487
Last Page 507
Subject National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey
Subject LCSH Poverty; Marital status; Mortality
Language eng
Bibliographic Citation Smith, K. R., & Waitzman, N. J. (1994). Double jeopardy: interaction effects of marital and poverty status on the risk of mortality. Demography, 31(3), 487-507.
Rights Management (c) Population Association of America
Format Medium application/pdf
Format Extent 1,329,002 bytes
Identifier ir-main,11534
ARK ark:/87278/s69w0zkg
Setname ir_uspace
ID 702329
Reference URL https://collections.lib.utah.edu/ark:/87278/s69w0zkg
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