Multidimensional socioeconomic gradients in biological age acceleration across 12 countries in the SHARE study
Year: 2026
Type: preprint
Abstract: Background Socioeconomic patterning has been documented across epigenetic, allostatic-load and clinical-biomarker measures of biological ageing. How these gradients vary across dimensions of social position and national settings remains unclear. Methods Cross-sectional analyses used 2015 data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) on 10,043 adults aged 50–75 years in 12 countries, with health follow-up through Wave 9. Sex-calibrated Klemera–Doubal method (KDM) age acceleration combined nine physiological indicators. Survey-weighted models examined four stand-alone indicators of socioeconomic position—respondent education, highest parental education, wealth and income—alongside education-based relational specifications for educational mobility and jointly modelled parental and respondent education ranks; τ summarised between-country dispersion. Results Across SES representations, six of seven pooled coefficients were inverse, ranging from − 0.067 SD for highest parental education to − 0.221 for wealth rank, while mutually adjusted parental education rank was close to zero ( β = − 0.017). A common-sample omnibus test showed overall variation among the seven specification-specific coefficients ( P < 0.001). Country-specific point estimates were predominantly negative. Estimated between-country dispersion was larger for respondent education, income, educational mobility and mutually adjusted respondent education rank ( τ = 0.053– 0.074), but small or at the boundary for highest parental education, wealth and mutually adjusted parental education rank ( τ = 0.000–0.013). Conclusions Socioeconomic gradients in KDM age acceleration were predominantly inverse but varied in magnitude across representations of socioeconomic position; their direction was broadly shared across countries, while the extent of between-country heterogeneity varied across representations. Key Messages Socioeconomic gradients in KDM age acceleration were predominantly inverse, but their magnitude varied across representations of socioeconomic position. These gradients showed substantial cross-national commonality in direction, alongside measure-specific differences in between-country heterogeneity. KDM age acceleration predicted subsequent health outcomes, while the pooled socioeconomic pattern was reproduced across alternative weighting and biomarker specifications.
Source: medRxiv
Author: Haotian Guo
Institution: University of Pennsylvania
Language: English
Subfield: Health
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7213466396