Research project Investigating the Influence of Working Conditions on the Initiation and Duration of the Fourth Age

Although life expectancies are increasing in Sweden, most people will spend several years in the “fourth age”, which is often seen as the period prior to death where we are dependent on others for the most basic aspects of daily life.

Prior research has demonstrated the importance of working conditions for health and function in old age; this project will use data already linked from several national registers (n≈80,000 people) to examine the influence of working conditions throughout work life on the initiation and duration of the fourth age, here defined as years of life with long-term care (institutional care and home-help services due to severe disability) after age 65. Job exposure matrices, which is a description of the working condition of each type of occupation, are matched to register information on job titles at multiple time points in order to create trajectories and measure accumulation. Additional analyses will examine whether the relationships between working conditions and future care use vary by sex, socioeconomic position (occupation, income and education), country of birth, and age at retirement.