Adult children's education, parental cognitive health, and the role of selection

Abstract

As the prevalence of Alzheimer's disease and related dementias (ADRD) rises in the United States, understanding social determinants of cognitive health has become increasingly important. While a robust literature highlights the downward transmission of (dis)advantage across generations, emerging research suggests that this transmission may also flow upwards from offspring to parents. Drawing on data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) parent sample, we examine the association between adult children's educational attainment and parental cognitive functioning at midlife using a propensity score matching approach to account for selection on observed confounders. We find that, although offspring college attainment is associated with better parental cognitive functioning in unadjusted models, selection largely explains this relationship. Subgroup analyses, however, reveal heterogeneity in the role of selection on the confounders observed here. Among college-educated parents, children's college attainment remains significantly predictive of better cognitive outcomes even after matching on observed confounders. This is not the case for parents without a college degree. These results support a resource multiplication perspective, wherein, compared to non-college-educated parents, college-educated parents' cognitive health is more impacted by their children's socioeconomic status. Our findings add to a growing literature calling attention to selection in intergenerational processes related to cognitive health and to the importance of examining heterogeneity in intergenerational effects.