Kabudula Chodziwadziwa W, Houle Brian, Collinson Mark A, Kahn Kathleen, Tollman Stephen, Clark Samuel
MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit (Agincourt), School of Public Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Department of Population Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK.
Soc Indic Res. 2017;133(3):1047-1073. doi: 10.1007/s11205-016-1397-z. Epub 2016 Jun 28.
Understanding the distribution of socioeconomic status (SES) and its temporal dynamics within a population is critical to ensure that policies and interventions adequately and equitably contribute to the well-being and life chances of all individuals. This study assesses the dynamics of SES in a typical rural South African setting over the period 2001-2013 using data on household assets from the Agincourt Health and Demographic Surveillance System. Three SES indices, an absolute index, principal component analysis index and multiple correspondence analysis index, are constructed from the household asset indicators. Relative distribution methods are then applied to the indices to assess changes over time in the distribution of SES with special focus on location and shape shifts. Results show that the proportion of households that own assets associated with greater modern wealth has substantially increased over time. In addition, relative distributions in all three indices show that the median SES index value has shifted up and the distribution has become less polarized and is converging towards the middle. However, the convergence is larger from the upper tail than from the lower tail, which suggests that the improvement in SES has been slower for poorer households. The results also show persistent ethnic differences in SES with households of former Mozambican refugees being at a disadvantage. From a methodological perspective, the study findings demonstrate the comparability of the easy-to-compute absolute index to other SES indices constructed using more advanced statistical techniques in assessing household SES.
了解社会经济地位（SES）在人群中的分布及其时间动态对于确保政策和干预措施充分且公平地促进所有人的福祉和生活机会至关重要。本研究利用阿金库尔健康与人口监测系统的家庭资产数据，评估了2001年至2013年期间南非一个典型农村地区的SES动态。从家庭资产指标构建了三个SES指数，即绝对指数、主成分分析指数和多重对应分析指数。然后将相对分布方法应用于这些指数，以评估SES分布随时间的变化，特别关注位置和形状的变化。结果表明，拥有与更多现代财富相关资产的家庭比例随时间大幅增加。此外，所有三个指数的相对分布都表明，SES指数的中位数向上移动，分布的两极分化程度降低，并向中间收敛。然而，从上端尾部的收敛幅度大于下端尾部，这表明较贫困家庭的SES改善速度较慢。结果还显示，SES存在持续的种族差异，前莫桑比克难民家庭处于不利地位。从方法学角度来看，研究结果表明，在评估家庭SES时，易于计算的绝对指数与使用更先进统计技术构建的其他SES指数具有可比性。
