The Impact of an Adult Child’s Emigration on the Mental Health

of Older Parents

Alan Barrett and Irene Mosca31 January 2014

Structure of the talk

• Motivation– why are we interested in the question of whether a child’s

emigration might impact upon the mental health of parents? – where is this paper placed in the literature?

• The data, the method and the variables – TILDA, a fixed effects approach and the mental health measures

• The sample and descriptive stats• Results• Conclusions

Motivation (1)

• Why is the research question of interest?• From a national (Irish) perspective– Emigration is often characterised as a

consequence of recession that affects younger people; but maybe there is an effect on older people too

• From an international perspective– A growing literature on the impact of migration on

the family members left behind (Antman, 2013)

Motivation (2)

• What are the impacts of migration on the family members left behind?

• On children’s education• On children’s health• On spouse’s labour supply• On parents’ health• This is where we come in

Data, method and variables (1)• TILDA Wave 1 collected between 2009 and 2011• Extensive information collected on 8,500 people aged 50

and over; response rate 62%• The data covers economic, social and health circumstances• Intensive efforts to keep people engaged between Wave 1

and Wave 2: birthday cards, newsletters, certificate of participation

• TILDA Wave 2 collected in 2012• Response rate was 90% (including an end-of-life interview

and proxy interview)

Data, method and variables (2)

• Critically for our purposes, we have measures of mental health for the respondents and we know where their children were living in Waves 1 and 2

• We also know a lot about other changes between Waves 1 and 2 such as bereavement, retirement, onset of illness

• Hence, we can explore whether mental health changed in response to a child’s emigration controlling for other changes over this period

Data, method and variables (3)

• By focusing on changes, we difference away time-invariant unobservables which may be correlated with both the child’s emigration and parental mental health

• We follow Lindeboom et al (2003) and Wooldridge and estimate a fixed effects model by differencing the basic equation and applying OLS

Data, method and variables (4)• Measuring mental health• Depression

– CESD is 20-item Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale. It measures the degree to which respondents have experienced a wide variety of depressive symptoms within the past week. Each of the 20 items is measured on a 4 point scale leading to a min score of 0 and a max score of 60.

– Self-rated emotional/mental health on a 1 (excellent)-5 (poor) scale

• Loneliness– UCLA Loneliness Scale. Cross-sectional score ranges between 0

(not lonely) to 10 (extremely lonely).

The sample

• We select people who are parents of children aged 16 and over at Wave 1; we exclude parents with children who are younger than 16

• We only look at parents all of whose children were living in Ireland at Wave 1

• This gives a sample of 2,912 parents• Of this group, 361 had seen a child emigrate

between Waves 1 and 2

Descriptive Stats – Variables in regressions

Men & Women togetherNo children emigrating

1+ children emigrating

Outcome variables Change in CES-D score, mean -0.518 0.151 Change in self-reported mental health score, mean 0.135 0.166 Change in UCLA loneliness score, mean 0.029 0.226

Demographic changes: Widowhood 1.5% 0.3% Decrease in number of close relatives/friends 43.8% 47.3% Health changes: New ADL 4.2% 1.4%** New IADL 5.6% 1.1%*** Cardiovascular disorder 21.9% 21.7% Chronic illness 26.6% 22.7% 1-point deterioration in self-reported health 19.8% 18.2% 2-point deterioration in self-reported health 4.8% 4.0% Economic changes: Retired 4.6% 6.3% Unemployed 1.1% 2.8%** Change in weekly individual gross income, mean 1.458 -15.755Changes in children’s conditions: 1+ children unemployed 11.6% 10.1% 1+ children widowed/separated/divorced/single 5.1% 5.1%

Variables not in regressionsMen & Women together

No children emigrating

1+ children emigrating

Age, mean 66.3 60.5***

Education:

Low 41.5% 22.7%*** Medium 43.8% 52.1%***

High 14.7% 25.2%***

Depression score at wave 1 6.07 4.68***Loneliness score at wave 1 1.60 1.47SR mental/emotional health at wave 1 2.22 2.17SR physical health at wave 1 2.67 2.47**

Descriptives for the children

Non-emigrating children

Emigrating children

Age, mean 35.9 28.6***

High education at w1 30.8% 43.8%***

Results

ΔCESD – full sample Men & women

Coeff. t stat.Widowhood 5.156*** (3.88)Decrease in number of close relatives/friends 0.731** (2.42)New ADL 1.828** (2.00)New IADL 0.544 (0.64)Cardiovascular disorder 0.945*** (2.68)Chronic illness 0.546 (1.58)1-point deterioration in self-reported health 0.944*** (2.87)2-point deterioration in self-reported health 2.024*** (2.97)Retired 1.072*** (2.65)Unemployed 0.634 (0.49)Change in income (000s) -0.0431 (-0.46)1+ children emigrated 0.809* (1.78)1+ children unemployed 0.305 (0.69)1+ children widowed/separated/divorced/single 0.965 (1.22) Constant -1.799*** (-7.67)N 2912

ΔCESD – men and womenWomen only Men only

Coeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.Widowhood 5.136*** (2.89) 5.001*** (3.20)Decrease in number of close relatives/friends 1.165*** (2.88) 0.128 (0.33)New ADL 2.378** (2.01) 0.643 (0.53)New IADL 0.473 (0.45) 0.880 (0.65)Cardiovascular disorder 1.024** (2.01) 0.838** (2.05)Chronic illness 0.808* (1.75) 0.0946 (0.19)1-point deterioration in self-reported health 1.760*** (3.80) -0.0973 (-0.23)2-point deterioration in self-reported health 1.363 (1.51) 3.080*** (2.81)Retired 1.179* (1.80) 0.821* (1.71)Unemployed -2.660 (-1.03) 1.980 (1.50)Change in income (000s) -0.0563 (-0.41) -0.0225 (-0.20)1+ children emigrated 1.229** (2.06) 0.292 (0.54)1+ children unemployed 0.418 (0.71) 0.0508 (0.09)1+ children widowed/separated/divorced/single 1.011 (0.96) 0.725 (0.86) Constant -2.380*** (-7.05) -1.019*** (-3.27)N 1707 1205

Δ self-rated mental healthWomen only Men only

Coeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.Widowhood 0.365 (1.46) 0.338 (1.16)Decrease in number of close relatives/friends -0.00512 (-0.10) 0.0345 (0.55)New ADL 0.0809 (0.51) 0.0711 (0.42)New IADL 0.0717 (0.51) 0.0177 (0.10)Cardiovascular disorder 0.00740 (0.11) 0.0122 (0.17)Chronic illness 0.113** (2.05) 0.0443 (0.54)1-point deterioration in self-reported health 0.419*** (5.98) 0.449*** (6.44)2-point deterioration in self-reported health 0.871*** (6.54) 1.020*** (5.69)Retired 0.0717 (0.64) 0.261** (2.45)Unemployed 0.203 (0.81) 0.224 (0.99)Change in income (000s) -0.00082 (-0.03) -0.0251 (-1.31)1+ children emigrated 0.166** (2.20) -0.0738 (-0.93)1+ children unemployed 0.117 (1.44) -0.0930 (-0.88)1+ children widowed/separated/divorced/single 0.188* (1.67) -0.0592 (-0.41) Constant -0.0677 (-1.44) -0.0436 (-0.87)N 1707 1205

Δ loneliness scoreWomen only Men only

Coeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.Widowhood 0.495 (0.65) 1.712* (1.94)Decrease in number of close relatives/friends 0.167 (1.47) 0.0468 (0.36)Change in positive exchanges score -0.0940*** (-5.56) -0.0504*** (-3.21)Change in negative exchanges score 0.0595*** (4.10) 0.0517*** (3.69)New ADL -0.480 (-0.88) 0.574 (0.94)New IADL -0.136 (-0.40) -0.200 (-0.33)Cardiovascular disorder -0.213 (-1.40) 0.00918 (0.06)Chronic illness 0.244* (1.76) -0.243 (-1.28)1-point deterioration in self-reported health 0.252* (1.70) -0.0500 (-0.30)2-point deterioration in self-reported health 0.446* (1.67) -0.277 (-1.18)Retired -0.0707 (-0.33) -0.0696 (-0.39)Unemployed 0.0838 (0.13) 0.506 (1.34)Change in income (000s) -0.164** (-2.29) 0.0135 (0.41)1+ children emigrated 0.432*** (2.78) -0.0320 (-0.14)1+ children unemployed -0.203 (-1.01) 0.362 (1.49)1+ children widowed/separated/divorced/single -0.00888 (-0.04) 0.127 (0.40) Constant -0.0945 (-0.89) 0.0338 (0.33)N 983 749

A potential problem

• (Apparently), people with poor mental health experience faster declines in mental health

• If this is the case, our fixed effects approach could still be producing misleading results

• To deal with this, we (1) restrict the sample to those with low CESD scores in Wave 1 (<16) and (2) we interact the “child emigrate” variable with a retrospective indicator of mental health problems

ΔCESD – CESD <16 at W1Women only Men only

Coeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.Widowhood 4.450*** (3.01) 4.300*** (3.17)Decrease in number of close relatives/friends 0.419 (1.21) 0.162 (0.48)New ADL 1.927 (1.40) 1.142 (0.96)New IADL 1.478 (1.56) 1.330 (1.04)Cardiovascular disorder 1.055** (2.23) 0.590 (1.57)Chronic illness 1.405*** (3.53) 0.216 (0.43)1-point deterioration in self-reported health 0.866* (1.96) -0.0946 (-0.28)2-point deterioration in self-reported health 1.201 (1.63) 2.602** (2.45)Retired 0.526 (0.83) 0.148 (0.31)Unemployed -0.149 (-0.07) 1.267 (0.94)Change in income (000s) -0.144 (-1.14) -0.0742 (-0.90)1+ children emigrated 0.917* (1.66) -0.0847 (-0.17)1+ children unemployed 0.120 (0.20) 0.296 (0.60)1+ children widowed/separated/divorced/single 1.410 (1.49) 0.332 (0.40) Constant -0.972*** (-3.40) -0.291 (-1.06)N 1511 1137

Δ self-rated mental health – good or better at W1Women only Men only

Coeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.Widowhood 0.358 (1.38) 0.297 (0.81)Decrease in number of close relatives/friends -0.00675 (-0.13) 0.0468 (0.75)New ADL 0.129 (0.75) 0.0365 (0.20)New IADL 0.251* (1.75) 0.0824 (0.39)Cardiovascular disorder 0.0326 (0.48) 0.0445 (0.60)Chronic illness 0.0853 (1.49) 0.0323 (0.38)1-point deterioration in self-reported health 0.381*** (5.49) 0.427*** (6.07)2-point deterioration in self-reported health 0.776*** (5.55) 1.064*** (5.76)Retired 0.0274 (0.24) 0.185* (1.73)Unemployed 0.246 (1.11) 0.156 (0.68)Change in income (000s) -0.00045 (-0.02) -0.0241 (-1.29)1+ children emigrated 0.181** (2.46) -0.128 (-1.58)1+ children unemployed 0.149* (1.78) -0.0335 (-0.31)1+ children widowed/separated/divorced/single

0.209* (1.88) -0.0803 (-0.58)

Constant 0.0527 (1.12) 0.0300 (0.60)N 1528 1120

  Mothers only Fathers only  Coeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.Widowhood 5.028*** (2.82) 4.892*** (3.15)Loss of close relatives/friends 1.132*** (2.83) 0.124 (0.32)Loss in functional capacity (new ADL) 2.286* (1.94) 0.712 (0.58)Loss in functional capacity (new IADL) 0.727 (0.71) 0.909 (0.67)Cardiovascular disorder 1.010** (1.99) 0.858** (2.09)Chronic illness 0.756* (1.65) 0.0768 (0.15)1-point deterioration in self-rated health 1.752*** (3.77) -0.120 (-0.29)2-point deterioration in self-rated health 1.356 (1.50) 3.012*** (2.74)Retirement 1.206* (1.82) 0.771 (1.60)Unemployment -2.709 (-1.04) 2.013 (1.52)Change in income (000s) -0.0470 (-0.34) -0.0348 (-0.32)Ref: No child’s emigration * no history of depression         No child’s emigration * history of depression -1.995 (-1.64) -1.741 (-1.20) Child’s emigration * no history of depression 0.870 (1.44) 0.308 (0.60) Child’s emigration * history of depression 7.108*** (2.97) -1.182 (-0.33)Child’s unemployment 0.430 (0.73) 0.109 (0.18)Child’s marital breakdown/widowhood 0.886 (0.85) 0.690 (0.82) Constant -2.229*** (-6.70) -0.934*** (-3.06)N 1706   1205  

ΔCESD; with interactions between history of mental health problems and child emigrate

• Does this suggest that there may be reverse causality?

• Were children whose parents had suffered a mental health problem more likely to emigrate?

• We test this by running a probit regression where “child emigrate” is now the dependent variable.

Probit with child emigrate as dependent variable  Mothers only Fathers only  Coeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.Age -0.0457*** (-6.47) -0.0519*** (-5.52)Medium education 0.164 (1.31) 0.161 (1.22)High education 0.285* (1.94) 0.407*** (2.73)Employed -0.175 (-1.13) -0.0969 (-0.61)Other -0.150 (-1.10) 0.0242 (0.12)Another town/city -0.179 (-1.35) -0.0101 (-0.07)Rural area -0.185 (-1.58) 0.0221 (0.16)Income 2nd quintile 0.0349 (0.26) -0.182 (-0.80)Income 3rd quintile -0.0703 (-0.41) -0.267 (-1.23)Income 4th quintile 0.149 (1.00) -0.0902 (-0.49)Income 5th quintile 0.0847 (0.49) -0.163 (-0.94)Married/cohabiting 0.0471 (0.41) 0.273 (1.63)Number of children 0.144*** (5.41) 0.187*** (5.57)Return migrant 0.160 (1.30) 0.346*** (2.61)Past diagnosis of depression -0.106 (-0.45) 0.306 (1.31)CES-D score -0.0145** (-1.98) -0.0119 (-1.09)Good self-rated health 0.0272 (0.27) 0.0175 (0.13)Fair/poor self-rated health -0.103 (-0.64) -0.0704 (-0.36)Past diagnosis of cancer -0.0406 (-0.22) 0.195 (0.73)Past diagnosis of heart attack -0.417 (-0.92) -0.918** (-2.23)Constant 1.290*** (2.66) 1.271** (2.09)N 1,589   1,134  

And can we take the push to emigrate as being an exogenous shock?

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Emigrants in 1,000s

Does it matter that the emigrants’ parents are younger?

Women only Men onlyCoeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.

Widowhood 7.455*** (3.22) 6.266*** (11.54)Decrease in number of close relatives/friends 1.479** (2.56) -0.282 (-0.53)Cardiovascular disorder 1.455** (1.97) 1.318** (2.33)Chronic illness 1.409** (2.17) -0.103 (-0.14)1-point deterioration in self-reported health 1.712*** (2.59) 0.300 (0.50)2-point deterioration in self-reported health 0.894 (0.58) 4.377*** (2.73)Retired 1.549 (1.55) 0.981* (1.65)1+ children emigrated 1.594** (2.30) 0.410 (0.62)1+ children widowed/separated/divorced/single 3.200** (2.37) 0.453 (0.36) Constant -2.788*** (-5.44) -0.979** (-2.22)N 1038 652

CESD regression for those aged 65 and under – only significant coefficients shown here

Does it matter if the emigrating child is a son or daughter?

Women only Men only

Coeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.

Child emigrating is male 1.162 (1.33) 0.161 (0.21)

Child emigrating is female 1.940** (2.21) 0.534 (0.59)

N 1733 1207

CESD regression – only showing coefficients for emigrant child dummy variables – Different point estimates but not statistically significant

Does it matter if the emigrating child was living with the parents at W1?

Women only Men only

Coeff. t stat. Coeff. t stat.

Child emigrating was co-resident at w1 1.036 (1.01) 0.571 (0.76)

Child emigrating was NOT co-resident at w1

1.355* (1.91) 0.0217 (0.03)

N 1753 1226

CESD regression – no statistically significant difference

Other things we looked at...

• Age of emigrating child• Does the emigrating child have children (ie.

grandchildren of our participants)• Results as expected but no statistically

significant differences between estimated coefficients

Conclusion

• There appears to be reasonably robust evidence that the emigration of an adult child affects of the mental health of mothers.

• But effect strongest among mothers with a previous history of depression

• This is important in itself but also in terms of how mental health impacts upon physical health

• There might also be impacts on potential emigrants and another dimension to Mincer’s (1978) “tied stayers”