The impact of values of men and women on their life expectancy

Abstract

The female advantage in life expectancy (LE) is found throughout the world, despite differences in living conditions. However, this advantage has diminished in recent years in countries with low mortality rates. In Russia, according to data for 2020, the difference in life expectancy at birth between women and men is 10 years (according to Rosstat) and is one of the highest in the world. The aim of our study is to find out what contribution to the gender gap in life expectancy can be made by the difference between men and women in terms of the value of health and the practice of self-caring behavior. To do this, we used data from the Sample Survey of Behavioral Factors Affecting the Health of the Population conducted by Rosstat in 2013, namely, the respondents' answers to a number of questions related to self-caring and health-preserving behavior. Using these questions, the level of the gap in the value of their own health and health-preserving behavior between Russian men and women is quantified according to the microdata of the survey using OLS regression and ordinal logit regression, where the respondent's answer to the question is used as a dependent variable, and the main independent variable is the gender of the respondent. The results showed that value attitudes to healthy lifestyle significantly affect health-preserving behavior. Correlations between the value of health and various aspects of health-preserving behavior turned out to be in the predicted direction. At the same time, at the level of the subjects of the Russian Federation, the analysis showed a high statistical significance of the following predictors of the gender gap in life expectancy: high levels of consumption of strong alcoholic beverages and tobacco smoking. The increase in the value of health among Russian men is here only of very limited importance for reducing the gender gap in life expectancy.