Changing Patterns of the Oldest Old’s Health by Period and across Birth Cohort

The analysis of this chapter moves to an empirical investigation of Chinese oldest old’s health. The chapter first describes how Chinese oldest old’s health status has changed during 1998 to 2018 by period and across birth cohorts. The chapter then uses CCREMs to show period and cohort variations when only including age, age-squared term, period and cohort in regression models to predict the oldest old’s health. Health is measured by self-rated health (SRH), chronic diseases, cognitive function, and subjective wellbeing which is indicated by positive and negative feelings. Descriptive results show that SRH and negative feeling scores are in a declining trend by period; but cognitive function and the average number of chronic diseases have showed a rising trend over time. The CCREM results show that the age-squared term is not significant, suggesting that age linearly relates to health measures. Age has a positive effect on SRH but it negatively relates to other health measures. Significant period and cohort effects are found. The most significant period effect is shown by a dip in year 2008 when estimating the respondent’s positive feeling scores. This is probably caused by the economic hardship and the Wenchuan earthquake that occurred in that year. It implies that unlike physical health, the oldest old’s subjective wellbeing is more likely to be influenced by social events occurred in unique time periods.