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Abstract:
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The size of the baby boom generation will result in a dramatic increase in the number of adult children caring for elderly parents. Despite this, few studies have specifically focused on whether the assistance elderly parents receive from their adult children varies according to the parent's marital status, and moreover, many of the studies that do exist are outdated. Objective: To examine whether parent's marital status effects transfers from adult children to their elderly parents. Design, Setting, and Participants: I analyzed data from the 2002 Health and Retirement Survey for 9,110 elderly individuals that are over age 65, living in the community, have at least one child, and are either married, widowed, or divorced. My analyses controlled for the parent's demographic, socio-economic, and health characteristics, as well as the child's employment status. Analyses: Three dummy dependent variables were constructed to analyze whether elderly parents receive care from their children. These are: co-residence between adult children and their elderly parent, financial transfers from adult children to their elderly parents, and time transfers from adult children to their elderly parents. The key explanatory variables of interest include marital status of the elderly parent. Results: Widowed elderly parents are significantly more likely to co-reside with their adult children compared to married and divorced elderly parents. The results of this study show that married parents are 45% less likely (p<.0001) and divorced parents are 46% less likely (p=.0026) to co-reside with their adult children compared to widowed parents. Married parents are 71% more likely to receive IADL help from their adult children than widowed parents (p<.0001). The results show no statistical difference between the likelihood that divorced or widowed parents will receive IADL help from their children. Furthermore, divorced parents actually receive more financial assistance than married and widowed parents. Compared to widowed parents, married parents are 22% less likely (p=.0297) and divorced parents are 45% more likely (p=.0179) to receive financial transfers from their adult children. Conclusions: This study contributes to previous research by using recent data to examine how an elderly parent's martial status influences the types of care received from adult children. The findings suggest that an elderly parents' marital status has a substantial effect on the type of transfers they receive from their adult children. The need for adult children to assist their elderly parents is likely to become even more widespread with the aging of the population. |