Gender disparity in disability among Chinese oldest-old: Age and cohort trends

Abstract

This study aimed at exploring gender disparity in disability and identifying related disablement process factors among Chinese oldest-old. Data came from eight waves of the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Study (CLHLS). A hierarchical logistic Age-Period-Cohort (A-P-C) model was used to estimate the trend of gender disparity, and related disablement process factors were further decomposed by the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition. Our results found that women had higher disabilities than men. The age-based trend of gender disparity in Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADL) continued to decline; that in Functional Limitation (FL) increased at first and then declined. The cohort-based trend of gender disparity in IADL showed a decreasing trend with each subsequent cohort; that in FL showed an increasing trend. Among the disablement process factors, health behaviors and social supports were the most important contributors to gender disparity in disability. The disability was higher for women than men, and the gender differences were attenuated at very old ages. To reduce gender disparities in disability, more attention should be paid to relevant factors of gender disparity in disability.

Keywords:

• Age-period-cohort model
• disability
• gender disparity
• oldest-old

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Study team for providing data and training in using the data sets for this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Credit author statement

Chaoping Pan and Cen Wang: conceptualization, methodology, data curation, formal analysis, writing. Mohammedhamid Osman Kelifa and Xuyang Li: polishing, review. Peigang Wang: conceptualization, methodology. All authors critically revised the manuscript and approved the final version.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in CLHLS at https://sites.duke.edu/centerforaging/programs/chinese-longitudinal-healthy-longevity-survey-clhls/.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by The National Social Science Fund of China under Grant number [21ZDA104].