Abstract

PEREZ AMADOR, Julieta  and  BRENES, Gilbert. A Transition at Advanced Ages: Changes in Residential Arrangements of Senior Citizens in Seven Latin American Cities. Estud. demogr. urbanos [online]. 2006, vol.21, n.3, pp.625-661. ISSN 2448-6515.  https://doi.org/10.24201/edu.v21i3.1243.

This article presents a preliminary, descriptive view of the changes in residential arrangements of the population ages 60 and over in seven Latin American cities. It explores the intensity of the change, the reasons behind it, the initial family and the physical change of dwelling. The data used in this study are drawn from the surveys on Health, Well-being and Ageing in Latin America and the Caribbean (Sabe) taken in the main urban zones of seven Latin American urban zones. The article begins with a comparative analysis of countries with data without standardizing them and subsequently presents logit-multinomial models that control for explanatory or confusing variables (age, index of artifacts). The main results show that the population of advanced age changes its residential arrangements in significant proportions in the seven Latin American cities considered here. Senior citizens’ sex and age are determining differentials in the scope of mobility, since older adults and women arte the most likely to change their family structure. The changes in family structure undergone by senior citizens combine stages in the course of the lives of individuals and families: foremost among these are when their offspring leave home to form unions and the transition to widowhood. Senior citizens living with their children and without their spouses change their family arrangements more frequently. Changing one’s residential arrangements does not necessarily lead to a physical change of dwelling, meaning that it is not always the senior citizen who moves in with others (whether relatives or non-relatives). Given that the cities selected reflect different stages in the demographic transition, controlling for demographic variables was expected to reduce the differences between countries, which did not in fact happen. This proven that certain cultural and institutional inequalities may be influecing these dissimilarities.

Keywords : residential arrangements; population of advanced age; ageing in Latin America and the Caribbean; family structure.