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Ageing and changing patterns in familial structure for older persons in India: a decomposition analysis

Preeti Dhillon (Save The Children, New Delhi, India)
Laishram Ladusingh (Department of Mathematical Demography and Statistics, International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai, India)
Gopal Agrawal (Department of Development Studies, International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai, India)

Quality in Ageing and Older Adults

ISSN: 1471-7794

Article publication date: 13 June 2016

326

Abstract

Purpose

At the turn of twenty-first century, India is facing rapid population ageing coupled with consequential socio-economic development changes. Against the backdrop of such changes, its traditional familial support system of living arrangements for older persons is swiftly changing, undergoing rapid transition towards nuclear family systems. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper examined: first, the changing trends and patterns in joint family systems defined in terms of households with older persons and total households; and second, socio-economic and demographic determinants of changes in the proportion of nuclear households with older adults. The decomposition analysis segregated the contribution of determinants of the change in nuclear households with older persons in three different components: propensity, composition, and interaction. The study used data from three successive rounds of the National Family Health Survey.

Findings

Results indicate that a lower proportion of households with older persons were nuclear compared to total households. However, for both types of households, nuclear households increased by nine percentage points during 1992-2006. Households with older persons that were headed by old aged persons, illiterates or females, situated in urban area, not owned agriculture land, lower affluent level, and from Southern India were at most risk of being nuclear than their counterparts.

Originality/value

This study provided ample evidence of the increase in nuclear familial structure for older persons in the course of population ageing. Population ageing, urbanization and increase in education, primarily contributed to the increase in nuclear family households of older persons.

Keywords

Citation

Dhillon, P., Ladusingh, L. and Agrawal, G. (2016), "Ageing and changing patterns in familial structure for older persons in India: a decomposition analysis", Quality in Ageing and Older Adults, Vol. 17 No. 2, pp. 83-96. https://doi.org/10.1108/QAOA-10-2014-0024

Publisher

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2016, Emerald Group Publishing Limited

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