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Applied Demography in the 21st Century pp 223–233Cite as

Dispersion of Registered Death Causes as a Function of Age in the 1999 U.S. Population

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It is a common proposition in gerontology that variation increases with increasing age. Examples are from many areas of investigations, such as physical performance. At 7 years of age almost all children can get out of their beds but none compete in marathon races while at 80 years of age there are some who are tied to their beds and some who compete in marathon races. Contrary to a possible phenomenon of increasing variation with higher age is the attitude towards the elderly. Attitudes consist of stereotyped concepts, emotions and behavioral dispositions. If the phenomenon captured by a stereotyped concept shows increasing variation with increasing age, then the stereotype will fit less well with increasing age. When this stereotyped concept constitutes one of the three components of an attitude towards the aged, there is a risk of discrimination against the aged in a society. This tendency has been labeled ageism (Butler 1969). In this context it is important to investigate variation as a function of age in a society.My main interest here is to investigate how the variation of registered death causes varies with increasing age. Death causes are registered in categories. Variation among frequencies of categories is often called dispersion. I examine how the dispersion of death causes varies with increasing age in the United States population of 1999.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Sociology, University of Gothenburg, Sweden

    Bo G. Eriksson

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  1. Bo G. Eriksson
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Rice University, Houston, TX, USA

    Steve H. Murdock

  2. University of California, Riverside, CA, USA

    David A. Swanson

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Eriksson, B.G. (2008). Dispersion of Registered Death Causes as a Function of Age in the 1999 U.S. Population. In: Murdock, S.H., Swanson, D.A. (eds) Applied Demography in the 21st Century. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-8329-7_13

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