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Determinants of the living arrangements of older people in Europe Déterminants des modes de vie des personnes âgées en Europe

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Abstract

This paper analyses the influence of relevant variables (age, sex, marital status, health, income, education and children) on the risk of belonging to one of the four main types of household in which old European people live nowadays: alone, with partner, with others, in a collective household. Nine countries with different social and political contexts are compared by using different data sources. These socio-demographic characteristics play the same role in all countries except for the influence of childlessness and of gender, but the geographical heterogeneity of the living arrangements remains partly unexplained due to currently inadequate comparative data sources for Europe.

Résumé

Cet article analyse 1’influence de facteurs socio-démographiques (âge, sexe, statut matrimonial, santé, revenu, niveau d’instruction, présence d’enfants) sur la probabilité d’appartenir à l’un des quatre types de ménage dans lesquels vivent les personnes âgées en Europe: seul, avec un partenaire, avec d’autres personnes, dans une institution. Neuf pays avec différents contextes sociaux et politiques sont comparés à 1’aide de diverses sources de données. Les caractéristiques socio-démographiques jouent le même rôle dans tous les pays, mis à part 1’influence du fait d’être sans enfant et du genre, mais 1’hétérogénéité géographique des types de ménages reste partiellement inexpliquée en raison de problèmes de comparabilité des sources de données en Europe.

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Acknowledgements

 We would like to thank the European Community for financing this project (Contract No. QLK6-CT 2002-02310) and our colleagues from the different national teams who provided the data that made this analysis possible: M. Poulain, L. Dal (GEDAP) for Belgium; J. Rychtarikova (Charles University in Prague) for the Czech Republic; P. Martikainen, E. Nihtilä (University of Helsinki) for Finland; G. Doblhammer, W. Apt (MPIDF) for Germany; G. De Santis, C. Seghieri, M. L. Tanturri (University of Florence) for Italy; H. Cruisen, P. Ekamper (NIDI) for the Netherlands; A. Fernandes, T. Veiga, F. de Castro Henriques (University of Lisbon) for Portugal; E. Grundy, C. Tomassini (LSHTM) for the UK. Furthermore, we would like to express our gratitude for his unfailing support to Patrick Festy (INED).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut National d’ Etudes Démographiques, 133, Bd Davout, 75980, Paris Cedex, France

    Joëlle Gaymu, Sabine Springer, Adrian Binet & Aline Désesquelles

  2. Fondation Nationale de Gérontologie, 49 rue Mirabeau, 75016, Paris, France

    Christiane Delbès

  3. London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, Centre for Population Studies, Bedford Square, London, WC21B 2DP, UK

    Stamatis Kalogirou

  4. Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Konrad Zuse Str. 1, 18057, Rostock, Germany

    Uta Ziegler

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  1. Joëlle Gaymu
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  2. Christiane Delbès
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Correspondence to Joëlle Gaymu.

Appendix: Definitions and data sources

Appendix: Definitions and data sources

1.1 Definitions of the four categories of living arrangements

  • Living alone: living in a one-person household

  • Living with a partner: living with a spouse or a cohabitee and possibly with others

  • Living with others: combines all other categories of private households (one-parent family or other forms of co-residence)

  • Living in a collective household: all persons not living in a private household, mainly in an “institution”. This category is not fully comparable between countries. However, persons living in sheltered housing units are sometimes included in this category and sometimes counted in the population of private households. This bias could not be eliminated in this study.

1.2 Sources: National census and register data supplied by FELICIE collaborators

Czech Statistical Office (census 2001), GSOEP (Germany, Microcensus 1999), INE (Portugal, census of 2001), INS (Belgium, census 2001), INSEE (France, census 1999), ISTAT (Italy, census 2001), Official Statistics of Finland (11% sample Population 2001:12, Families 2000, Helsinki: Statistics Finland), ONS (United Kingdom, 2001 Sample of Anonymised Records), Statistics Netherlands (Netherlands register, 2003).

1.3 Health definitions used in France/Germany/UK comparison

  • In Germany care need was defined according to the Long-Term Care Need Insurance that was introduced in 1995 (fair health = person needs care at least once daily for at least two Activities of Daily Living, poor health = person needs personal care at least three times daily).

  • In France, the Colvez indicator was used (poor health means severe disability— persons confined to bed or armchair or who cannot wash or dress and undress without assistance; fair health means moderate disability—persons unable to go out of their home (or the institution) without assistance).

  • In the United Kingdom; two different health-related variables were tested. The first is self-reported health status, the second is self-assessment of whether or not a person has a long-term illness, health problem or disability that limits their daily activities or the work they can do, including problems that are due to old age. In the results shown here, the latter was used.

1.4 Income definition for France

Income per unit of consumption. Household income is divided by an equivalence scale (equal to 1 for the first adult in the household, 0.5 for the other adults or adolescents and 0.3 for children under 14) to take account of economies of scale.

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Gaymu, J., Delbès, C., Springer, S. et al. Determinants of the living arrangements of older people in Europe Déterminants des modes de vie des personnes âgées en Europe. Eur J Population 22, 241–262 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10680-006-9004-7

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