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. 2024 Jul 10;23(1):140.
doi: 10.1186/s12939-024-02144-0.

Multigenerational inequalities of opportunity in health outcomes

Namal N Balasooriya  1 , Jayatilleke S Bandara  2 , Nicholas Rohde  3
Affiliations

Multigenerational inequalities of opportunity in health outcomes

Namal N Balasooriya et al. Int J Equity Health. .

Abstract

This paper studies multigenerational health transmission mechanisms in Australian panel data. Using inequality-of-opportunity (IOP) models, we demonstrate that grandparental socioeconomic status (SES) is an important determinant of personal health, even after controlling for health and SES at the parental level. Our findings hold over a range of health/biomarkers of individuals' physical and mental well-being and appear to be especially sensitive to educational outcomes on the father's side. Since ingrained socioeconomic (dis)advantages that persist over multiple generations may be indicative of social class, our results suggest that subtle attitudinal and behavioural characteristics associated with this variable may be a key factor driving health disparities.

Keywords: Children’s health; Health behaviours; Health outcomes; Inequality of opportunity; Multigenerational inequality; Social class.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interests.

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