Suchergebnisse

Based on probabilistic samples of 12,000 adults in eight Latin American countries, this article studies two dimensions of social capital—(1) community participation and (2) trust in neighbors— and their relation with urbanization, fertility, out-migration, and crime. Its purpose is to determine whether social capital explains some of the differential demographic behavior of urban populations. The data show that social capital clearly declines with urbanization, although the urban-poor show a bit higher community participation. There is a clear gradient of increased crime and reduced social capital related to urbanization. The relationship between social capital and fertility and migration is less clear and often restricted to certain sub-populations. The urban-poor do not exhibit demographic behavior significantly different than the expected given its compositional and spatial characteristics. Basándose en muestras probabilísticas de 12.000 adultos de ocho países latinoamericanos, se estudian dos dimensiones del capital social –(1) participación comunitaria y (2) confianza en los vecinos– y su relación con urbanización, fecundidad, emigración y crimen. El objetivo es determinar el grado en que el capital social explica el comportamiento demográfico diferenciado que presentan las poblaciones urbanas. Los datos muestran que capital social claramente disminuye con la urbanización, aunque los pobres de las ciudades exhiben una participación comunitaria algo mayor. Se observa una clara gradiente de mayor crimen y menor capital social asociados a urbanización. La relación de capital social con fecundidad y emigración es menos clara y con frecuencia restringida a ciertas subpoblaciones. Los pobres de las ciudades no muestran un comportamiento demográfico significativamente distinto de lo esperado dadas sus características composicionales y espaciales.

Mortality in the United States is 18% higher than in Costa Rica among adult men and 10% higher among middle-aged women, despite the several times higher income and health expenditures of the United States. This comparison simultaneously shows the potential for substantially lowering mortality in other middle-income countries and highlights the United States' poor health performance. The United States' underperformance is strongly linked to its much steeper socioeconomic (SES) gradients in health. Although the highest SES quartile in the United States has better mortality than the highest quartile in Costa Rica, US mortality in its lowest quartile is markedly worse than in Costa Rica's lowest quartile, providing powerful evidence that the US health inequality patterns are not inevitable. High SES-mortality gradients in the United States are apparent in all broad cause-of-death groups, but Costa Rica's overall mortality advantage can be explained largely by two causes of death: lung cancer and heart disease. Lung cancer mortality in the United States is four times higher among men and six times higher among women compared with Costa Rica. Mortality by heart disease is 54% and 12% higher in the United States than in Costa Rica for men and women, respectively. SES gradients for heart disease and diabetes mortality are also much steeper in the United States. These patterns may be partly explained by much steeper SES gradients in the United States compared with Costa Rica for behavioral and medical risk factors such as smoking, obesity, lack of health insurance, and uncontrolled dysglycemia and hypertension.

SummaryLifetime reproductive histories of a 1984–85 nationally representative sample of 870 women aged 25–59 years provided data to describe the evolution of fertility, contraception, breast-feeding, and natural fecundability in Costa Rica between 1960 and 1984. The contraceptive prevalence rate increased from 23% in 1965 to 58% in 1975 and 66% in 1984. Duration of breast-feeding was stable during the 1960s, decreased in the early 1970s, and increased after about 1976. Fecundability among women who did not practise contraception was lower than expected and declined between 1960 and 1975, probably because of selection effects. Despite a high consistency between estimations from the reproductive histories and other sources of data, some suggestion of omissions of short periods of contraceptive use in the distant past was detected. The survey may have reduced recall errors by using a calendar that summarizes major life events together. The analysis demonstrated the feasibility and usefulness of asking for lifetime reproductive histories in fertility surveys in developing countries.

Official figures show that life expectancy in Costa Rica is longer than in the United States (US), in spite of the fact that per capita health expenditure is only one-tenth that of the US. To check whether this is for real and to explore some of its determinants, 900 Costa Ricans aged 60+ were followed from 1984 to 2001. Follow-up household visits were made, deaths were tracked in the national death registry, and survival status in the voting registry was double-checked. In addition, the survivors were contacted in 2002. Two-thirds of the panel had died by December 2001. Kaplan–Meier curves, life tables and Cox regression were used to analyse the panel's survival. Mortality in the panel was slightly higher than the Costa Rican average and similar to that in the US, confirming the exceptional longevity of Costa Ricans. Survival was substantially lower among unmarried men and individuals with limited autonomy at the beginning of the study. The effect of socioeconomic status is weak. Insurance effects seem to be confounded by selection biases.

Résumé Cet article propose une méthode indirecte pour valider les décomptes du nombre d'immigrés en Espagne établis à partir des registres municipaux de population, qui pourraient surestimer le nombre d'immigrés du fait de doubles enregistrements et de défauts de radiation en cas de départ du pays. La méthode proposée utilise deux types d'informations?: le nombre de naissances issues d'immigrés et leurs taux de fécondité. Les statistiques de naissances par origine des parents proviennent de l'état civil espagnol?; les taux de fécondité sont estimés à partir de l'Enquête nationale sur les immigrés de 2007. Pour les femmes, l'estimation indirecte ne diffère pas significativement du décompte dans le registre, ce qu'on peut considérer comme une validation des deux sources. Pour les hommes, le registre de population dénombre 15?% d'immigrés de plus que l'estimation indirecte, avec un écart statistiquement significatif. Comparés aux estimations proposées dans cet article, les dénombrements des hommes et femmes provenant d'Europe occidentale et des hommes de Roumanie présentent un excédent important. À l'inverse, le rapport est faiblement inférieur à 1 pour les hommes et femmes d'Équateur et les hommes d'Afrique, ce qui suggère un sous-enregistrement de ces groupes par le registre de population.