The Emergence of the Socioeconomic Gradient in Health among Children in Immigrant Families

• In Event: 203 - Regular Session. Population Process - Migration

Abstract

In the United States, socioeconomic disparities in child health are striking—health is a marker of population welfare that is unequally distributed at the time of birth. The association between parental resources and child health is more ambiguous among children in immigrant families, however, despite strong disparities in child health in native-born families. Immigrant mothers and their infants often experience more favorable health than would be expected on the basis of their socioeconomic resources. Moreover, there is evidence of a weaker socioeconomic patterning to health among immigrant adults than among native-born adults, as well as among babies born to immigrant vs. native-born mothers—despite evidence of socioeconomic gradients in health among second-generation adolescents. These findings suggest that a gradient in health emerges within a generation. I will examine the emergence of the educational gradient in health among children in immigrant families. Longitudinal data spanning the period of birth through middle childhood will permit examination of two questions: 1) when does the gradient in health emerge among children in immigrant families?; and 2) does the gradient emerge more quickly among children who experience rapid change in their family circumstances?

Author

• Margot Jackson, Brown University