Kenneth Land | Duke University (original) (raw)

Papers by Kenneth Land

Children's well-being, 2012

Social Psychological and Personality Science, Feb 8, 2017

Twenge, Sherman, and Lyubomirsky (TSL) claim that long-term cultural changes have increased young... more Twenge, Sherman, and Lyubomirsky (TSL) claim that long-term cultural changes have increased young adults' happiness while reducing mature adults' happiness. To establish their conclusion, TSL use trend analyses, as well as more sophisticated mixed-effects models, but their analyses are problematic. In particular, TSL's trend analyses ignore a crucial cohort effect: well-known lower happiness among baby boomers. Furthermore, their data aggregation obscures the ephemerality of a recent period effect: the Great Recession. Finally, TSL overlook a key finding of their mixedeffects models that both pre-and post-Boomer cohorts became happier as they aged from young to mature adults. Our reanalyses of the data establish that the Baby Boomer cohort, the short-lived Great Recession, and unfortunate data aggregation account for TSL's results. The wellestablished, long-term relationship between age and happiness remains as it has been for decades despite any cultural shifts that may have occurred disfavoring mature adults.

Mechanisms of Ageing and Development, May 1, 2010

The Gln 27 Glu polymorphism but not the Arg 16 Gly polymorphism of the beta2-adrenergic receptor ... more The Gln 27 Glu polymorphism but not the Arg 16 Gly polymorphism of the beta2-adrenergic receptor (ADRB2) gene appears to be associated with a broad range of aging-associated phenotypes, including cancers at different sites, myocardial infarction (MI), intermittent claudication (IC), and overall/healthy longevity in the Framingham Heart Study Offspring cohort. The Gln 27 Gln genotype increases risks of cancer, MI and IC, whereas the Glu 27 allele or, equivalently, the Gly 16 Glu 27 haplotype tends to be protective against these diseases. Genetic associations with longevity are of opposite nature at youngold and oldest-old ages highlighting the phenomenon of antagonistic pleiotropy. The mechanism of antagonistic pleiotropy is associated with an evolutionary-driven advantage of carriers of a derived Gln 27 allele at younger ages and their survival disadvantage at older ages as a result of increased risks of cancer, MI and IC. The ADRB2 gene can play an important systemic role in healthy aging in evolutionary context that warrants exploration in other populations.

Springer eBooks, 2015

The editors of this volume have identified their goal as describing “… how research is really don... more The editors of this volume have identified their goal as describing “… how research is really done, not just focusing on the end result—new methods or data sets” that is, to provide “… case studies, not of the innovations themselves, but of the thought processes that led to these research ideas” (Maltz, 2013). The specific charge to me was “In particular, aside from producing a bumper crop of researchers, you’ve played with crime and related data in ways that broke new ground. Too many people have a tendency to grab some data sets, toss them into one of the [four standard general purpose statistical analysis software packages], look for a nice low p-value, and write a paper (and perhaps a career) using it—which is something not found in your work (and that of your former students). What we’d like you to do is explain how you approach problems, how you know whether your findings are significant, when you feel that a new statistical approach is needed” (Maltz, 2013).

The Springer series on demographic methods and population analysis, 2016

Age is a major risk factor for phenotypes characterizing human health, well-being, and survival i... more Age is a major risk factor for phenotypes characterizing human health, well-being, and survival in late life. The risks of these phenotypes expressed in forms of pathological dysregulation of physiological functions, incidence or prevalence of diseases, case fatality, or mortality also change with age. This change integrates all challenges occurring in a human organism during the life course by a given age. Accordingly, the age patterns of various age-related phenotypes are a valuable source of information about health-related processes in human organisms.

The Springer series on demographic methods and population analysis, 2016

Life expectancy in humans worldwide has been experiencing dramatic increases for the past two cen... more Life expectancy in humans worldwide has been experiencing dramatic increases for the past two centuries (Oeppen and Vaupel 2002). In most countries, the extension of lifespan is associated with a transition from a long historical period of high fertility and high mortality (particularly infant mortality (Singh and Yu 1995)) to low fertility and low mortality. This demographic trend leads to rapidly growing populations of the elderly (e.g., the United Nations projects a nearly twofold increase in the proportion of the 60+ population from about 10–21 % over the next five decades (UN 2007)) which raises serious concerns about a possible accompanying expansion of morbidity and disability, especially in developed countries (Olshansky et al. 2007; Robine 2003; Sierra et al. 2009). Because morbidity is in a causative pathway to disability (Verbrugge and Jette 1994), reducing the burden of morbidity could lead to compression of years of unhealthy life.

SAGE Publications, Inc. eBooks, May 15, 2012

ocial indicators are statistical time series "used to monitor the social system, helping to ident... more ocial indicators are statistical time series "used to monitor the social system, helping to identify changes and to guide intervention to alter the course of social change" (Ferriss 1988:601). Examples include unemployment rates, crime rates, estimates of life expectancy, health status indices, school enrollment rates, average achievement scores, election voting rates, and measures of subjective well-being with life as a whole. This chapter begins with a review of the historical development of the field, and then defines the main types of social indicators in use today. This is followed by a section on the uses of social indicators, including a description of a sociological model of social change that includes social indicators. A concluding section describes the prospects for future developments in social indicators.

Social Indicators Research, Oct 10, 2017

It has recently been claimed that Sen's capabilities approach can be used to advise the formation... more It has recently been claimed that Sen's capabilities approach can be used to advise the formation of public policy related to human wellbeing. It has also been proposed that measures of subjective wellbeing are inadequate for this purpose. These ideas are examined in relation to capabilities, using the same reference material as the proposing author. The theory of subjective wellbeing homeostasis is used as the alternative framework by which to understand the potential of subjective wellbeing for policy advice. This examination reveals an almost complete lack of evidence that capability measurement could fulfill the suggested role. While subjective wellbeing has more potential for this purpose, caveats to its employment for policy advice are also evident. Keywords Capabilities Á Subjective wellbeing Á Public policy Á Measurement Á Homeostasis Á Theory Annie Austin has made an important contribution to social indicators research by questioning the kinds of information used in making public policy. She joins a long list of authors over the past few decades in doubting the wisdom of continuing to accord sovereign status to economic indicators. As she says, there is an evident need to develop planning models that represent ''people-centered rather than economic-growth centered development'' Austin (2016, p. 135). Austin approaches this topic of policy advice is from a legal-ethical perspective, and considers the relative merits of two sources of information. One is the use of 'wellbeing' as defined within psychology. The other concerns Sen's outstanding and original & Robert A. Cummins

The Springer series on demographic methods and population analysis, 2016

The tremendous research potential of U.S. Medicare data for evaluation of current, and forecastin... more The tremendous research potential of U.S. Medicare data for evaluation of current, and forecasting of future, patterns of aging-related diseases among older U.S. adults remains largely unexplored. In this chapter, we present and discuss the results of a series of epidemiologic and biodemographic measures that can be studied using the Medicare Files of Service Use. Specifically, we present analyses of age patterns of disease incidence, their time trends, recovery and long-term remission after disease onsets, interdependence of multiple coexisting disease risks, mortality at advanced ages, and multimorbidity patterns. Empirical analyses, regression models, and methods of mathematical modeling are used to evaluate their characteristics. U.S. Medicare data serve as an example of Big Data that is a powerful source of information about current and historic health of older U.S. adults.

American Sociological Review, Dec 1, 1971

Reiss, Jr., Occupations and Social Status. New York: The Free Press. Duncan, 0. D., Ray Cuzzort a... more Reiss, Jr., Occupations and Social Status. New York: The Free Press. Duncan, 0. D., Ray Cuzzort and Beverley Duncan 1961 Statistical Geography. Glencoe, Illinois: The Free Press. Harris, Chauncy and Edward Ullman 1945 "The nature of cities." The Annals 242: 7-17. Hatt, Paul K. 1946 " ...

Routledge eBooks, Feb 6, 2018

Carolina Digital Repository (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), 2016

This paper investigates historical changes in both single-year-of-age adult mortality rates and v... more This paper investigates historical changes in both single-year-of-age adult mortality rates and variation of the single-year mortality rates around expected values within age intervals over the past two centuries in 15 developed countries. We apply an integrated Hierarchical Age-Period-Cohort-Variance Function Regression Model to data from the Human Mortality Database. We find increasing variation of the single-year rates within broader age intervals over the life course for all countries, but the increasing variation slows down at age 90 and then increases again after age 100 for some countries; the variation significantly declined across cohorts born after the early 20th century; and the variation continuously declined over much of the last two centuries but has substantially increased since 1980. Our further analysis finds the recent increases in mortality variation are not due to increasing proportions of older adults in the population, trends in mortality rates, or disproportionate delays in deaths from degenerative and man-made diseases, but rather due to increasing variations in young and middle-age adults.

Carolina Digital Repository (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), 2016

This paper investigates historical changes in both single-year-of-age adult mortality rates and v... more This paper investigates historical changes in both single-year-of-age adult mortality rates and variation of the single-year mortality rates around expected values within age intervals over the past two centuries in 15 developed countries. We apply an integrated Hierarchical Age-Period-Cohort-Variance Function Regression Model to data from the Human Mortality Database. We find increasing variation of the single-year rates within broader age intervals over the life course for all countries, but the increasing variation slows down at age 90 and then increases again after age 100 for some countries; the variation significantly declined across cohorts born after the early 20th century; and the variation continuously declined over much of the last two centuries but has substantially increased since 1980. Our further analysis finds the recent increases in mortality variation are not due to increasing proportions of older adults in the population, trends in mortality rates, or disproportionate delays in deaths from degenerative and man-made diseases, but rather due to increasing variations in young and middle-age adults.

Children's well-being, 2012

Social Psychological and Personality Science, Feb 8, 2017

Twenge, Sherman, and Lyubomirsky (TSL) claim that long-term cultural changes have increased young... more Twenge, Sherman, and Lyubomirsky (TSL) claim that long-term cultural changes have increased young adults' happiness while reducing mature adults' happiness. To establish their conclusion, TSL use trend analyses, as well as more sophisticated mixed-effects models, but their analyses are problematic. In particular, TSL's trend analyses ignore a crucial cohort effect: well-known lower happiness among baby boomers. Furthermore, their data aggregation obscures the ephemerality of a recent period effect: the Great Recession. Finally, TSL overlook a key finding of their mixedeffects models that both pre-and post-Boomer cohorts became happier as they aged from young to mature adults. Our reanalyses of the data establish that the Baby Boomer cohort, the short-lived Great Recession, and unfortunate data aggregation account for TSL's results. The wellestablished, long-term relationship between age and happiness remains as it has been for decades despite any cultural shifts that may have occurred disfavoring mature adults.

Mechanisms of Ageing and Development, May 1, 2010

The Gln 27 Glu polymorphism but not the Arg 16 Gly polymorphism of the beta2-adrenergic receptor ... more The Gln 27 Glu polymorphism but not the Arg 16 Gly polymorphism of the beta2-adrenergic receptor (ADRB2) gene appears to be associated with a broad range of aging-associated phenotypes, including cancers at different sites, myocardial infarction (MI), intermittent claudication (IC), and overall/healthy longevity in the Framingham Heart Study Offspring cohort. The Gln 27 Gln genotype increases risks of cancer, MI and IC, whereas the Glu 27 allele or, equivalently, the Gly 16 Glu 27 haplotype tends to be protective against these diseases. Genetic associations with longevity are of opposite nature at youngold and oldest-old ages highlighting the phenomenon of antagonistic pleiotropy. The mechanism of antagonistic pleiotropy is associated with an evolutionary-driven advantage of carriers of a derived Gln 27 allele at younger ages and their survival disadvantage at older ages as a result of increased risks of cancer, MI and IC. The ADRB2 gene can play an important systemic role in healthy aging in evolutionary context that warrants exploration in other populations.

Springer eBooks, 2015

The editors of this volume have identified their goal as describing “… how research is really don... more The editors of this volume have identified their goal as describing “… how research is really done, not just focusing on the end result—new methods or data sets” that is, to provide “… case studies, not of the innovations themselves, but of the thought processes that led to these research ideas” (Maltz, 2013). The specific charge to me was “In particular, aside from producing a bumper crop of researchers, you’ve played with crime and related data in ways that broke new ground. Too many people have a tendency to grab some data sets, toss them into one of the [four standard general purpose statistical analysis software packages], look for a nice low p-value, and write a paper (and perhaps a career) using it—which is something not found in your work (and that of your former students). What we’d like you to do is explain how you approach problems, how you know whether your findings are significant, when you feel that a new statistical approach is needed” (Maltz, 2013).

The Springer series on demographic methods and population analysis, 2016

Age is a major risk factor for phenotypes characterizing human health, well-being, and survival i... more Age is a major risk factor for phenotypes characterizing human health, well-being, and survival in late life. The risks of these phenotypes expressed in forms of pathological dysregulation of physiological functions, incidence or prevalence of diseases, case fatality, or mortality also change with age. This change integrates all challenges occurring in a human organism during the life course by a given age. Accordingly, the age patterns of various age-related phenotypes are a valuable source of information about health-related processes in human organisms.

The Springer series on demographic methods and population analysis, 2016

Life expectancy in humans worldwide has been experiencing dramatic increases for the past two cen... more Life expectancy in humans worldwide has been experiencing dramatic increases for the past two centuries (Oeppen and Vaupel 2002). In most countries, the extension of lifespan is associated with a transition from a long historical period of high fertility and high mortality (particularly infant mortality (Singh and Yu 1995)) to low fertility and low mortality. This demographic trend leads to rapidly growing populations of the elderly (e.g., the United Nations projects a nearly twofold increase in the proportion of the 60+ population from about 10–21 % over the next five decades (UN 2007)) which raises serious concerns about a possible accompanying expansion of morbidity and disability, especially in developed countries (Olshansky et al. 2007; Robine 2003; Sierra et al. 2009). Because morbidity is in a causative pathway to disability (Verbrugge and Jette 1994), reducing the burden of morbidity could lead to compression of years of unhealthy life.

SAGE Publications, Inc. eBooks, May 15, 2012

ocial indicators are statistical time series "used to monitor the social system, helping to ident... more ocial indicators are statistical time series "used to monitor the social system, helping to identify changes and to guide intervention to alter the course of social change" (Ferriss 1988:601). Examples include unemployment rates, crime rates, estimates of life expectancy, health status indices, school enrollment rates, average achievement scores, election voting rates, and measures of subjective well-being with life as a whole. This chapter begins with a review of the historical development of the field, and then defines the main types of social indicators in use today. This is followed by a section on the uses of social indicators, including a description of a sociological model of social change that includes social indicators. A concluding section describes the prospects for future developments in social indicators.

Social Indicators Research, Oct 10, 2017

It has recently been claimed that Sen's capabilities approach can be used to advise the formation... more It has recently been claimed that Sen's capabilities approach can be used to advise the formation of public policy related to human wellbeing. It has also been proposed that measures of subjective wellbeing are inadequate for this purpose. These ideas are examined in relation to capabilities, using the same reference material as the proposing author. The theory of subjective wellbeing homeostasis is used as the alternative framework by which to understand the potential of subjective wellbeing for policy advice. This examination reveals an almost complete lack of evidence that capability measurement could fulfill the suggested role. While subjective wellbeing has more potential for this purpose, caveats to its employment for policy advice are also evident. Keywords Capabilities Á Subjective wellbeing Á Public policy Á Measurement Á Homeostasis Á Theory Annie Austin has made an important contribution to social indicators research by questioning the kinds of information used in making public policy. She joins a long list of authors over the past few decades in doubting the wisdom of continuing to accord sovereign status to economic indicators. As she says, there is an evident need to develop planning models that represent ''people-centered rather than economic-growth centered development'' Austin (2016, p. 135). Austin approaches this topic of policy advice is from a legal-ethical perspective, and considers the relative merits of two sources of information. One is the use of 'wellbeing' as defined within psychology. The other concerns Sen's outstanding and original & Robert A. Cummins

The Springer series on demographic methods and population analysis, 2016

The tremendous research potential of U.S. Medicare data for evaluation of current, and forecastin... more The tremendous research potential of U.S. Medicare data for evaluation of current, and forecasting of future, patterns of aging-related diseases among older U.S. adults remains largely unexplored. In this chapter, we present and discuss the results of a series of epidemiologic and biodemographic measures that can be studied using the Medicare Files of Service Use. Specifically, we present analyses of age patterns of disease incidence, their time trends, recovery and long-term remission after disease onsets, interdependence of multiple coexisting disease risks, mortality at advanced ages, and multimorbidity patterns. Empirical analyses, regression models, and methods of mathematical modeling are used to evaluate their characteristics. U.S. Medicare data serve as an example of Big Data that is a powerful source of information about current and historic health of older U.S. adults.

American Sociological Review, Dec 1, 1971

Reiss, Jr., Occupations and Social Status. New York: The Free Press. Duncan, 0. D., Ray Cuzzort a... more Reiss, Jr., Occupations and Social Status. New York: The Free Press. Duncan, 0. D., Ray Cuzzort and Beverley Duncan 1961 Statistical Geography. Glencoe, Illinois: The Free Press. Harris, Chauncy and Edward Ullman 1945 "The nature of cities." The Annals 242: 7-17. Hatt, Paul K. 1946 " ...

Routledge eBooks, Feb 6, 2018

Carolina Digital Repository (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), 2016

This paper investigates historical changes in both single-year-of-age adult mortality rates and v... more This paper investigates historical changes in both single-year-of-age adult mortality rates and variation of the single-year mortality rates around expected values within age intervals over the past two centuries in 15 developed countries. We apply an integrated Hierarchical Age-Period-Cohort-Variance Function Regression Model to data from the Human Mortality Database. We find increasing variation of the single-year rates within broader age intervals over the life course for all countries, but the increasing variation slows down at age 90 and then increases again after age 100 for some countries; the variation significantly declined across cohorts born after the early 20th century; and the variation continuously declined over much of the last two centuries but has substantially increased since 1980. Our further analysis finds the recent increases in mortality variation are not due to increasing proportions of older adults in the population, trends in mortality rates, or disproportionate delays in deaths from degenerative and man-made diseases, but rather due to increasing variations in young and middle-age adults.

Carolina Digital Repository (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), 2016

This paper investigates historical changes in both single-year-of-age adult mortality rates and v... more This paper investigates historical changes in both single-year-of-age adult mortality rates and variation of the single-year mortality rates around expected values within age intervals over the past two centuries in 15 developed countries. We apply an integrated Hierarchical Age-Period-Cohort-Variance Function Regression Model to data from the Human Mortality Database. We find increasing variation of the single-year rates within broader age intervals over the life course for all countries, but the increasing variation slows down at age 90 and then increases again after age 100 for some countries; the variation significantly declined across cohorts born after the early 20th century; and the variation continuously declined over much of the last two centuries but has substantially increased since 1980. Our further analysis finds the recent increases in mortality variation are not due to increasing proportions of older adults in the population, trends in mortality rates, or disproportionate delays in deaths from degenerative and man-made diseases, but rather due to increasing variations in young and middle-age adults.