Older person’s living arrangements and health in rural South Africa: confirming social positioning?

Enid Schatz, University of Missouri, Columbia
Margaret L. Ralston, Mississippi State University
Sangeetha Madhavan, University of Maryland
Don Willis, University of Missouri
F. Xavier Gómez-Olivé, University of the Witwatersrand
Mark Collinson, University of the Witwatersrand

Although older persons are usually regarded as dependent household members, we explore ways that older persons may be productive household members. We believe that living arrangements are the result of and/or result in older people being dependent on those with whom they live in some cases, and taking on productive roles in others. In this paper, we extend a typology established in previous work of older persons’ living arrangements based on social positioning to examine associations between older person’s social positioning and health. Using 2010 survey and census data from Agincourt, South Africa, we provide evidence that older people are more likely to report poor health, poor quality of life, and higher levels of disability when they live in “productive” arrangements (single generation, complex linked) than in those where they are likely dependent (two generation, linear linked). Further, within each category women report worse outcomes than men.