ReviewJournal of epidemiology and community health2024
Intergenerational transmission of health inequalities: towards a life course approach to socioeconomic inequalities in health - a review.
Review in Journal of epidemiology and community health, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 23 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
23 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Nutrition items regulated by school nutrition policies in the USA and academic performance: a review of the non-policy literature.Public health nutrition · 2026Pooled it
- The mediating role of brain structural-functional connectivity coupling in linking paternal education to BMI and depressive scores in young adults.BMC psychiatry · 2026Article
- Social determinants of mid-life mental health decline: a life-course analysis from the 1970 British Cohort Study.European journal of public health · 2026Article
- Evaluating the role of youth-onset diabetes mellitus in the context of food insecurity and preventive care: a repeated cross-sectional study using propensity score weighted machine learning analysis.BMJ paediatrics open · 2026Article
- Beliefs, barriers, and behaviors: Exploring dementia prevention perspectives in culturally diverse populations in The Netherlands.Journal of Alzheimer's disease : JAD · 2026Article
- Circulating Extracellular Vesicles Suggest Race-Associated Transcriptomic Differences in Preterm Birth: A Pilot Study.International journal of molecular sciences · 2026Article
- Association and mediating pathways between intergenerational educational mobility and depressive symptoms: findings from high- and middle-income countries.BMC medicine · 2026Article
- Associations between adverse childhood experiences and family health in adulthood: a national cross-sectional analysis.Archives of public health = Archives belges de sante publique · 2026Article
- The magnitude and population burden of educational inequalities in adverse birth outcomes.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Time trends and area-level socioeconomic inequalities in early childhood development at 2-2.5 years old in England between 2019 and 2025: a local area ecological study.BMJ public health · 2026Article
- COVID-19, economic downturn, and long-term trajectories of population mental health: Evidence from two nationally representative British birth cohorts at the intersection of gender and socioeconomic position.Social science & medicine (1982) · 2026Article
- Intergenerational Socioeconomic Mobility and Cardiovascular Health Among Hispanic/Latino Youth and Caregivers Living in the United States.Journal of the American Heart Association · 2025Article
- Article
- Exploring Family Typologies and Health Outcomes in a Dutch Primary Care Population of Children Living in Urban Cities in the Netherlands: A Latent Class Analysis.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2025Article
- Disruption and inequity in work, family and mental health: a longitudinal study of Australian mothers before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.BMC public health · 2025Article
- How Tay adolescent girls and their female carers navigate sexual and reproductive health information.Health promotion international · 2025Article
- Co-occurrence and associated factors of developmental delay, functional disability, and undernutrition in early childhood: evidence from 15 population-based surveys in sub-Saharan African countries.EClinicalMedicine · 2025Article
- Socioeconomic Status Across the Life-Course and Frailty in Older Age: Evidence From Switzerland.International journal of public health · 2025Article
- Polycystic Ovary Syndrome and Labor Market Attachment: Sequence Analysis.International journal of public health · 2025Article
- Respiratory rate and its associations with disease and lifestyle factors in the general population - results from the KORA-FF4 study.PloS one · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Adult health inequalities are a persistent public health problem. Explanations are usually sought in behaviours and environments in adulthood, despite evidence on the importance of early life conditions for life course outcomes. We review evidence from a broad range of fields to unravel to what extent, and how, socioeconomic health inequalities are intergenerationally transmitted.We find that transmission of socioeconomic and associated health (dis)advantages from parents to offspring, and its underlying structural determinants, contributes substantially to socioeconomic inequalities in adult health. In the first two decades of life-from conception to early adulthood-parental socioeconomic position (SEP) and parental health strongly influence offspring adult SEP and health. Socioeconomic and health (dis)advantages are largely transmitted through the same broad mechanisms. Socioeconomic inequalities in the fetal environment contribute to inequalities in fetal development and birth outcomes, with lifelong socioeconomic and health consequences. Inequalities in the postnatal environment-especially the psychosocial and learning environment, physical exposures and socialisation-result in inequalities in child and adolescent health, development and behavioural habits, with health and socioeconomic consequences tracking into adulthood. Structural factors shape these mechanisms in a socioeconomically patterned and time-specific and place-specific way, leading to distinct birth-cohort patterns in health inequality.Adult health inequalities are for an important part intergenerationally transmitted. Effective health inequality reduction requires addressing intergenerational transmission of (dis)advantage by creating societal circumstances that allow all children to develop to their full potential.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.