Online Lecture 3: Life course determinants of mortality

Lecturer: Prof. Tommy Bengtsson, Lund University

Content of the lecture/ workshop: The lecture starts with an overview of the long-term mortality decline contrasting underlying period and cohort factors. It reviews the studies from the 1930s onwards in which synthetic cohorts based on country data have been used, as well as later studies at regional levels, and their limitations. It then introduces life-cycle models and biological and social mechanisms to understand health patterns and gives examples using longitudinal individual-level data. It gives examples of how shocks in food supply and disease exposure in early life lead to social and economic disadvantages later in life as well as to poor health.

Objectives of the lecture/ workshop: On a general level the student will acquire knowledge about theories explaining the role of life-course factors for health and well-being. It will also introduce ways to apply causal modeling combining contextual information with longitudinal individual level data.

Requirements: Active participation, and it is advisable to review two articles to facilitate an informed discussion during class.

Recommended reading: 

• Barker, D. J. P. (2001) Fetal and infant origins of adult disease. Monatsschrift Kinderheilkunde, 149, Supplement 1, S2-S6
• Bengtsson, T. (2015) Mortality: The Great Historical Decline. In International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences, 868-783
• Bengtsson, T., & Lindström, M. (2003) Airborne infectious diseases during infancy and mortality in later life in southern Sweden, 1766-1894. International Journal of Epidemiology, 32, 2, 286-294
• Crimmins, E. M., & Finch, C. E. (2006). Infection, inflammation, height, and longevity. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 103, 2, 498-503
• Helgertz, J & Bengtsson, T (2019), The Long-Lasting Influenza: The Impact of Fetal Stress During the 1918 Influenza Pandemic on Socioeconomic Attainment and Health in Sweden, 1968–2012, Demography, 56, 4, 1389-1425
• Helgertz, J., & Nilsson, A. (2019) The effect of birth weight on hospitalizations and sickness absences: a longitudinal study of Swedish siblings. Journal of Population Economics 32, 53–178
• Kuh, D. & Ben-Shlomo, Y. (eds.) (2004) A life course approach to chronic disease epidemiology. Oxford: OUP, Ch 2, 15-37, Ch 16, 371-395
• Lazuka, V, Quaranta, L & Bengtsson, T (2016), ‘Fighting infectious disease: Evidence from Sweden 1870-1940’, Population and Development Review, 42, 1, 27-52

You can download the presentation by Tommy Bengtsson in .pdf