Understanding the intergenerational impact of migration: an adult mortality advantage for the children of forced migrants?

Wilson, Ben ORCID: 0000-0003-4274-617X, Wallace, Matthew and Saarela, Jan (2024) Understanding the intergenerational impact of migration: an adult mortality advantage for the children of forced migrants? Epidemiology, 35 (5). 589 - 596. ISSN 1044-3983

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Abstract

Background: Children of immigrants often have excess mortality rates, in contrast to the low mortality typically exhibited by their parents’ generation. However, prior research has studied children of immigrants who were selected for migration, thereby rendering it difficult to isolate the intergenerational impact of migration on adult mortality. Methods: We use semiparametric survival analysis to carry out a total population cohort study estimating all-cause and cause-specific mortality among all adult men and women from age of 17 years among all men and women born in 1953–1972 and resident in Finland in 1970–2020. We compare children of forced migrants from ceded Karelia, an area of Finland that was ceded to Russia during the Second World War, with the children of parents born in present-day Finland. Results: Children with two parents who were forced migrants have higher mortality than children with two parents born in Northern, Southern, and Western Finland, but similar or lower mortality than the subpopulation of children whose parents were born in the more comparable areas of Eastern Finland. For women and men, a mortality advantage is largest for external causes and persists after controlling for socioeconomic factors. Conclusion: Our findings suggest that forced migration can have a beneficial impact on the mortality of later generations, at least in the case where forced migrants are able to move to contextually similar locations that offer opportunities for rapid integration and social mobility. The findings also highlight the importance of making appropriate comparisons when evaluating the impact of forced migration.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2024 The Author(s)
Divisions:	Methodology
Subjects:	R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman J Political Science > JV Colonies and colonization. Emigration and immigration. International migration
Date Deposited:	20 Sep 2024 09:12
Last Modified:	18 Oct 2024 20:15
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/125473

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