TY - THES T1 - The Impact of Body Weight on Physical Functioning Across the Later Years Y1 - 2001 A1 - Kristi Rahrig Jenkins KW - Adult children KW - Health Conditions and Status KW - Healthcare KW - Net Worth and Assets AB - An extensive body of literature analyzes the impact of body weight and various health outcomes documenting that extremes in body weight adversely effect health. Much less is known about how body weight specifically impacts physical functioning. Some studies, however, have shown an association between having excessive body weight and heightened risk for certain diseases and functional impairment. With evidence that the population is becoming heavier in greater proportions than in the past, body weight as it contributes to physical functioning remains a critical health problem. The project addresses some of the questions central to body weight and physical functioning. For example, how do certain socioeconomic and demographic characteristics, health behaviors, and health characteristics effect the relationship between body weight and physical functioning? Is the effect of body weight specific to certain functional domains? In addition, is the basic relationship between body weight and physical functioning different in young old populations than in old old populations? Using longitudinal data from the Health and Retirement Study (sample of young old adults) and asset and health dynamics among the oldest old survey (sample of old old adults) logistic regression models on the loss of physical functioning (1 = impaired) over a two year period are estimated for the young old and old old separately. A model comparing the young old and the old old is also estimated. Results indicate that body weight, more specifically obesity, impacts physical functioning across various domains of impairment. When influencing these domains, body weight acts directly but also indirectly with other factors (socioeconomic and demographic characteristics, health behaviors, and health characteristics). In addition, important differences exist by cohort membership. The project concludes by addressing implications and areas for future research. PB - Wayne State University UR - Database ID: DAI-A 62/12, p. 4349, Jun 2002 U4 - Gerontology (0351) JO - The Impact of Body Weight on Physical Functioning Across the Later Years ER - TY - JOUR T1 - Health Consequences of Marriage for the Retirement Years JF - Journal of Family Issues Y1 - 2000 A1 - Pienta, Amy M. A1 - Mark D Hayward A1 - Kristi Rahrig Jenkins KW - Adult children KW - Demographics KW - Health Conditions and Status KW - Retirement Planning and Satisfaction AB - Over the last few decades there has been an increasing trend toward divorce, postponed marriage, never marrying, and cohabitation. It is also known that marriage increases ones health, mainly because of the ability to gain from the help of a spouse or other relatives that transfer finances and time to the married person. How will changes in marriage trends effect the health of people as they reach retirement ages? What aspects of health are linked to marriage? Married persons from this data were the least likely to be afflicted by any of the diseases or limitations studied. Widowed and divorced persons were found to have the worst overall health of any two groups. However, cohabiting people were not much better off then the widowed or divorced persons. The authors also break down the data further and compare genders and races. Exiting marriage, surprisingly, was worse then never having been married. PB - 21 VL - 21 IS - 5 U4 - Marital Status/Retirement Planning/Health Status/Gender ER -