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From: ed@mtxinu.UUCP (Ed Gould)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Re: Life Expectancy (Correction and Clarification)
Message-ID: <386@mtxinu.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 24-May-85 14:34:20 EDT
Article-I.D.: mtxinu.386
Posted: Fri May 24 14:34:20 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 27-May-85 07:29:11 EDT
References: <601@astrovax.UUCP>
Reply-To: ed@mtxinu.UUCP (Ed Gould)
Distribution: net
Organization: mt Xinu, Berkeley, CA
Lines: 57

In article <601@astrovax.UUCP> elt@astrovax.UUCP (Ed Turner) writes:
>In a followup to my original posting on female vs. male life expectancies, I
>incorrectly stated that the death rate during the first year of life is
>"nearly twice as large" for male infants as for female ones.  This was based
>on my (faulty) memory.  The actual figure for the US is that it is 27% higher.
>In fact this ratio is maintained throughout the early childhood years when
>"behavioral" differences are minimal and is probably a fair indication of the
>"natural" bias.

I'll agree that it isn't a behavioral difference on the part of the child,
but I don't know that I believe that it's natural.  I suspect, rather,
that it's a behavioral bias on the parents' part.  There have been studies
done about the way parents relate to infants and toddlers based on the
sex of the child.  There is a substantial difference in how protective
parents are of young children:  Boys are given much more leeway to
explore and experiment with their surroundings than are girls.

I don't have any documentation on these experiments, although I'm sure
it could be found.  I saw, not too long ago, a report on PBS about
one such study conducted in England, where parents were placed in
a room with an infant for an hour and observed.  It was nearly universal
that the "boys" were given *much* less protection than the "girls."  As one
of the controls on the experiment, the same child was dressed differently.
When dressed as a boy, the parents reacted as if the child were a boy,
and when dressed like a girl, as if the child were a girl.

>As people age, "behavioral" factors clearly become more important for a time.
>For instance, the death rate for men of ages 20 to 24 is MORE THAN THREE
>TIMES GREATER than for women of the same age.  It seems likely to me that
>this huge bias is largely "behavioral".

These are, probably, behavioral/cultural biases affecting the individuals
involved directly.

>As people become "elderly" the gap again narrows to 20 to 50% effects.  These
>figures would apply for people over about 60 years of age.  This is also the
>rough range of differences in survival rates for men and women with specific
>life threatening diseases.  Again this would seem to reflect the rough
>magnitude of the "natural" effect.

I'm not convinced.  What's natural and what's behavioral?  There is definitely
a correlation between "will to live" and survival rates for illnesses.  It
seems to me that that's mostly another behavioral/cultural bias that
favors women.

>Of course, in evaluating these figures, it is important to remember that the
>total death rate is much higher in the first year and last years of life than
>in the middle (i.e., far more people die before their first birthday or when
>they are say 75 than when they are 22).  Thus, the modest "natural" biases of
>the early and late years are more important overall than the huge "behavioral"
>biases of the middle years.

True - the death rate comparisons - but I don't see that it's relevant.

-- 
Ed Gould		    mt Xinu, 2910 Seventh St., Berkeley, CA  94710  USA
{ucbvax,decvax}!mtxinu!ed   +1 415 644 0146