Religious activity, life expectancy, and disability-free life expectancy in Taiwan
- PDF / 217,305 Bytes
- 8 Pages / 595.276 x 790.866 pts Page_size
- 93 Downloads / 207 Views
ORIGINAL INVESTIGATION
Religious activity, life expectancy, and disability-free life expectancy in Taiwan Mira Hidajat • Zachary Zimmer • Yasuhiko Saito Hui-Sheng Lin
•
Published online: 5 April 2013 Ó Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013
Abstract Research has implicated religious activity as a health determinant, but questions remain, including whether associations persist in places where Judeo-Christian religions are not the majority; whether public versus private religious expressions have equivalent impacts, and the precise advantage expressed as years of life. This article addresses these issues in Taiwan. 3,739 Taiwanese aged 53? were surveyed in 1999, 2003, and 2007. Mortality and disability were recorded. Religious activities in public and private settings were measured at baseline. Multistate lifetables produced estimates of total life expectancy and activity of daily living (ADL) disability-free life expectancy across levels of public and private religious activity. There is a consistent positive gradient between religious activity and expectancy with greater activity related to longer life and more years without disability. Life and ADL disability-free life expectancies for those with no religious affiliation fit in between the lowest and highest religious activity groups. Results corroborate evidence in the West. Mechanisms that intervene may be similar in Eastern religions despite differences in the ways in which popular religions are practiced. Results for those with no Responsible Editor:D. J. H. Deeg. M. Hidajat University of Utah, Salt Lake City, USA Z. Zimmer (&) University of California, San Francisco, USA e-mail: [email protected] Y. Saito Nihon University, Tokyo, Japan H.-S. Lin Bureau of Health Promotion, Taichung, Taiwan
affiliation suggest benefits of religion can be accrued in alternate ways. Keywords Religion Disability Life expectancy Activities of daily living Asia Multistate life-tables
Introduction Over the last couple of decades there has been growing interest in the link between religious activity and health outcomes, and for good reason. Religious activity has been empirically linked to an array of attributes that impact upon health outcomes, such as personal values, locus of control, feelings of self, health related behaviors, intergenerational associations, and coping mechanisms (Ellison and Levin 1998; Gillum 2006; Hill et al. 2007; Hummer et al. 1999, 2004; Iwasaki et al. 2002; Krause 2004, 2002; Krause et al. 2002; Lawler-Row and Elliott 2009; Obisesan et al. 2006; Ryan and Willits 2007; Strawbridge et al. 2001). This research has provided good evidence that strong religious convictions, especially when combined with frequent attendance of religious services, results in longer and functionally healthier lives (Chida et al. 2009; Gillum et al. 2008; Hummer et al. 1999; Helm et al. 2000; Hill et al. 2005; Idler and Kasl 1997; Kelley-Moore and Ferraro 2001; Koenig et al. 1999; Krause et al. 1999; La Cour et al. 2006; Oman and Reed 1998; Roff et al. 2006; Stra
Data Loading...
