Exposure to Family Member Deaths Across the Life Course for His panic Individuals

The present study doc u ments differ ences in expo sure to fam ily mem ber deaths among for eign-born and U.S.-born His panic indi vid u als com pared with non-His panic Black and non-His panic White indi vid u als. We use data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS; 1992-2016, ages 51+; N = 23,228) and the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health; Waves I-V, ages 12-43; N = 11,088) to esti mate the risk of expo sure to the death of a mother, father, spouse, sib ling, and child across the life course. HRS results show more inequities in expo sure to fam ily deaths com pared with Add Health results, suggesting differ ences by age or birth cohort. Compared with non-His panic Whites, U.S.-born His panic indi vid u als in the HRS have a higher risk of expe ri enc ing a child's death through out adult hood and a sib ling's death in later life; the lat ter is explained by larger sibship size, indi cat ing a greater life time risk of bereave ment expe ri ences. The higher risk of paren tal death dur ing child hood for U.S.-born and for eign-born His panic indi vid u als is explained by covariates (e.g., lower levels of edu ca tional attain ment). His panic indi vid u als gen er ally have a lower risk of fam ily deaths than non-His panic Black indi vid u als, but at times a higher risk of expo sure rel a tive to non-His panic White indi vid u als.