Education and Health in Late-Life Among High School Graduates: Cognitive Versus Psychological Aspects of Human Capital

Abstract

Just as postsecondary schooling serves as a dividing line between the advantaged and disadvantaged on measures ranging from income to marital status, it also serves as a diving line between the healthy and unhealthy. Why are the better educated healthier? The human capital theory posits that education makes you healthier via cognitive (general and specific skill improvements) and non-cognitive psychological resources (traits like conscientiousness and a sense of mastery). I employ the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study (WLS, 1957-2003/5) to test the relative strength of measures of cognitive human capital (academic performance) versus noncognitive psychological human capital (personality and psychological orientations) in explaining the relationship between educational attainment and health outcomes among high school graduates. I find little evidence of an important role for noncognitive psychological human capital, but find a relatively significant role for cognitive human capital, as measured by high school academic performance, which both weakens the association between education and health and is correlated with health independent of educational attainment. It is not just obtaining a degree or additional years of schooling; academic performance is strongly linked to health in late-life.