Chen Dan
School of Public Administration, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, China.
Sci Rep. 2025 Jan 4;15(1):826. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-85570-6.
Parental well-being is linked to the life chances of adult children in later life. Despite accumulated knowledge on the role of children's education on parental longevity in developed contexts, it remains unknown how children's education may influence the trajectories of parental physical well-being over the aging process, particularly in developing contexts. Using a growth curve model and four-wave data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study, this study examines the association between children's education and parental physical functioning trajectories as parents age. This study yields several findings. First, adult children's schooling is negatively associated with the limited physical functioning of older parents. Second, consistent with the cumulative disadvantage perspective, this study confirms the diverging parental health trajectories across different children's education groups as parents age. The linear rate of decline in parental physical functioning is slower among older adults with better-educated children. Third, the education returns of sons and daughters with regard to their parents' physical functioning are similar to each other, implying the rationale for gender-blind attitudes in parenthood. Fourth, children's education has a compensatory effect among parents lacking institutional old-age support. The association between children's education and parental physical functioning is significant among rural older adults only.
父母的幸福感与成年子女晚年的生活机遇相关。尽管在发达背景下，关于子女教育对父母长寿的作用已有大量知识积累，但在衰老过程中，子女教育如何影响父母身体健康状况的轨迹仍不清楚，尤其是在发展中背景下。本研究使用增长曲线模型和中国健康与养老追踪调查的四期数据，考察了随着父母年龄增长，子女教育与父母身体机能轨迹之间的关联。本研究得出了几个结论。第一，成年子女的受教育程度与老年父母有限的身体机能呈负相关。第二，与累积劣势观点一致，本研究证实了随着父母年龄增长，不同子女教育组的父母健康轨迹存在差异。子女受教育程度较高的老年人，其父母身体机能的线性下降速度较慢。第三，儿子和女儿在父母身体机能方面的教育回报彼此相似，这意味着在为人父母方面采取无视性别的态度是合理的。第四，子女教育在缺乏机构养老支持的父母中具有补偿作用。子女教育与父母身体机能之间的关联仅在农村老年人中显著。
