The Effect of Early Psychosocial Risks on Health: Based on Data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study

Abstract

In the context of the continuous growth of the aging population, priority has been given to the health promotion strategy of “orientation toward prevention and reduction of disease occurrence.” On the basis of the assessment of disability weights in the Global Burden of Disease (GBD), we assigned disability weights to the data on health conditions in the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS), using Years Lived with Disability (YLDs) as a quantitative indicator to evaluate the predictive effect of early psychosocial risks on health in old age. The results show that early psychosocial risks significantly increase YLDs in old age and have significant predictive power for high-risk health conditions among the elderly, and that the relationship between the two is causal. In addition, the study identifies four early psychosocial risks that lead to serious deterioration of the quality of life in old age: physical violence, childhood migration, maternal mental health and paternal physical health. These findings have significant implications for preventing the occurrence of aging diseases derived from the distal period of the individual’s lifetime and for implementing “full life cycle health management.”