Effect of College Selectivity on Later-life Health and Mortality: Evidence from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study

• In Event: 523 - Section on Sociology of Education Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 21. Health and Education

Abstract

The relationship between educational attainment and health and mortality has been well documented. While most research has focused on how the quantity of education affects health, quality of education is often overlooked. I extend the work of Fletcher and Frisvold (2014) to consider how college selectivity affects later adult health outcomes and mortality using longitudinal data from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study. College selectivity does not affect mortality and did not affect most of the health outcomes of interest. Those who attended more selective colleges were less likely to have hypertension and were more likely in one model to rate their health as better. By the 2016 ASA annual conference I plan to extend this research to run separate analyses for men and women and also for high SES and low SES respondents to examine heterogeneity of affects. I also plan to extend this work to understand whether cause of death is affected by college selectivity.

Author

• Sarah Garcia, University of Minnesota