The Demography of Modern Social Transformations
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University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations 2015 The Demography of Modern Social Transformations Arun Hendi University of Pennsylvania, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations Part of the Demography, Population, and Ecology Commons, and the Family, Life Course, and Society Commons Recommended Citation Hendi, Arun, "The Demography of Modern Social Transformations" (2015). Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations. 1757. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1757 This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1757 For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Demography of Modern Social Transformations Abstract This dissertation examines three contemporary social phenomena—globalization, the rise of secondary and tertiary education, and dramatic changes in marriage and divorce—and their relation to key demographic processes. This set of topics is purposely broad, in order to demonstrate the importance of interlinkages between demography and the social world. Classical demographic techniques can be extended to provide a toolkit through which one can investigate and provide insight into a diverse set of social processes. Chapter I examines the relationship between globalization and contemporary fertility transitions. Fertility transitions have been studied since the inception of the field of demography, but we still have a limited understanding of how they arise, progress, and diffuse across populations. I test the theory that since 1960, global normative forces led to fertility transitions in many developing countries. I show that countries that are more connected through the global network have converged in fertility. In particular, poor countries engaged in trade with rich countries have converged towards the fertility rates of their rich trade partners. Chapter II considers how the changing educational distribution in the United States has shaped educational differentials in life expectancy. Though educational gradients in longevity have widened since 1990, many have questioned whether this widening is due to people with less than high school becoming a smaller, increasingly select group. I use a composition-adjusted life expectancy measure to show that much of the change in education-specific life expectancy can be attributed to changing educational composition. Adjusting for compositional change shows that life expectancy gradients have not widened by nearly as much as we thought. Chapter III traces out the history of American marriage since 1960. I develop and extend two-sex models of the marital life cycle to quantify how changes in marriage, divorce, mortality, and assortative mating have shaped marital life cycles. I find that there has been an educational divergence in marriage and divorce, and demonstrate that much of the truncation in marriage can be attributed to later age at marriage and higher rates of divorce, but is partly offset by lower mortality and more extensive marital sorting. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Demography First Advisor Irma T. Elo Keywords Divorce, Fertility, Globalization, Life Expectancy, Marriage, Mortality Subject Categories Demography, Population, and Ecology | Family, Life Course, and Society | Sociology This dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: https://repository.upenn.edu/edissertations/1757 THE DEMOGRAPHY OF MODERN SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS Arun S. Hendi A DISSERTATION in Demography and Sociology Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2015 Supervisor of Dissertation __________________________ Irma T. Elo Professor of Sociology Graduate Group Chairperson, Demography __________________________ Michel Guillot, Associate Professor of Sociology Graduate Group Chairperson, Sociology __________________________ Emily Hannum, Associate Professor of Sociology Dissertation Committee Irma T. Elo, Professor of Sociology Michel Guillot, Associate Professor of Sociology Samuel H. Preston, Professor of Sociology THE DEMOGRAPHY OF MODERN SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS COPYRIGHT 2015 Arun S. Hendi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I have been at Penn for ten years now, and from the very first week of my freshman year through the very last minutes of writing this dissertation, Jessica Ho has been there with me helping me along. Her tremendous intellect, broad knowledge base, and demographic expertise are surpassed only by her kindness, eagerness to help, and willingness to tolerate my many eccentricities. She listened carefully when I tried to explain my difficulties, and she likely spent hundreds of hours reading my drafts and critiquing my logic. She also celebrated my victories and took me to get gelato and visit new restaurants. I would not have been able to write this dissertation or to become as skilled a demographer had it not been for Jess. Irma Elo has been an extraordinary advisor. The thing I like most about Irma is that she keeps me on my toes—she expects excellence, and she has a way of letting you know that she thinks you can meet this lofty goal. She provided excellent feedback on all of my research and helped me integrate into the profession. Her suggestions have improved my dissertation tremendously, and I can’t thank her enough. Michel Guillot is the smartest and quickest demographer I know. I often envied his ability to quickly grasp a concept and relate it back to the basic principles of demography. Michel’s advice was always packed with insight. His encouragement often spurred me to think more deeply about demographic problems, and I very much appreciated the amount of freedom he allowed me in developing solutions. Sam Preston was generous with his advice and praise. Very often I would drop into his office for an ad hoc meeting and take up half an hour peppering him with every question I had thought up in the last month. His answers were astute and often led to new research questions I hadn’t yet considered. Sam is good at seeing the greatest potential in someone and in their work, and his praise always raised my spirits. Mauro Guillén gave me my first job as an undergraduate work-study research assistant, and I very much doubt I would have gone to graduate school in the social sciences were it not for him. He has supported me throughout my undergraduate and graduate education, and I owe him a tremendous debt of gratitude. Jere Behrman, Doug Ewbank, Emily Hannum, Kristen Harknett, Hans-Peter Kohler, and Herb Smith all gave helpful advice and encouragement throughout my time in Penn Demography. Herb, in particular, read through a very early draft of the first chapter of this dissertation (when it was quite awful), and gave very detailed and incisive comments about how to write a research paper that I still revisit from time to time. In the past four years, I had many interesting intellectual discussions that helped me grow as a scholar. I was particularly happy to have Helena Cruz Castanheira, Ezra Fishman, and Nikkil Sudharsanan as my interlocutors in many illuminating conversations about the field of demography. Their understanding of population science and mental dexterity helped create an intellectual atmosphere in the graduate group that made Penn Demography a very exciting place to be over the last few years. iii I owe much of my intellectual curiosity and skill to my parents, who raised me right, taught me everything from algebra to how to install flooring, and kept me happy and healthy. My siblings, Aditi and Abhishek, were encouraging and put up with my inability to give them a short definition of what exactly a demographer does. Finally, I thank the University of Pennsylvania, which paid for almost a decade of my education and has been home for me through all of my adult life. All of my research since 2011 has been support by the National Institute on Aging [T32 AG000177] and the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development [T32 HD007242]. Parts of Chapter II have appeared in: Hendi, A. S. (2015). Trends in U.S. Life Expectancy Gradients: The Role of Changing Educational Composition. International Journal of Epidemiology, (Forthcoming). iv ABSTRACT THE DEMOGRAPHY OF MODERN SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS Arun S. Hendi Irma T. Elo This dissertation examines three contemporary social phenomena—globalization, the rise of secondary and tertiary education, and dramatic changes in marriage and divorce—and their relation to key demographic processes. This set of topics is purposely broad, in order to demonstrate the importance of interlinkages between demography and the social world. Classical demographic techniques can be extended to provide a toolkit through which one can investigate and provide insight into a diverse set of social processes. Chapter I examines the relationship between globalization and contemporary fertility transitions. Fertility transitions have been studied since the inception of the field of demography, but we still have a limited understanding of how they arise, progress, and diffuse across populations. I test the theory that since 1960, global normative forces led to fertility transitions in many developing countries. I show that countries that are more connected through the global network have converged in fertility. In particular, poor countries engaged in trade with rich countries have converged towards the fertility rates of their rich trade partners.