Final Report Summary - RE-AGEING (Reassessing Ageing from a Population Perspective)
This project developed new approaches to the study of age and ageing that are appropriate for 21st-century conditions. We developed a new paradigm in conceptualizing population ageing: the Characteristics Approach to the measurement of population ageing. The hallmark of the approach is the consistent use of changing characteristic schedules together with changing age structures. The approach includes conventional measures of chronological age but is far more general, since ageing is a multidimensional phenomenon and chronological age is only one of the dimensions (Sanderson and Scherbov 2013). Other characteristics of people such as physical and mental health and many others are not distinguished by traditional measures of ageing (Scherbov and Sanderson 2016, Scherbov and Weber 2017). The new approaches to measure ageing based on people’s characteristics that for example, take into account increasing longevity, were used to measure current and future ageing based on population projections for almost all countries in the world up to 2100 (Sanderson, Scherbov and Gerland 2017). Now these groundbreaking findings are being applied in the world’s leading international source of data on population ageing: they are being incorporated in a UN official report on ageing (http://www.iiasa.ac.at/web/home/about/news/171006-UN-aging.html). This milestone reflects a growing recognition that traditional measures no longer reflect the changing face of ageing around the world. We showed that when applying new measures of ageing increases in life expectancy lead to slower ageing (Sanderson and Scherbov 2015). We introduced a new and simple measure for human wellbeing across countries, called the Human Life Indicator (HLI), that takes inequality into account and could replace the commonly used but error-prone Human Development Index (HDI) (Ghislandi, Sanderson and Scherbov 2018). The Human Life Indicator expresses wellbeing in terms of years of life, similar to life expectancy at birth. However, unlike any other current measure, it takes not only the mean value but also the inequality in longevity into account. The wide availability of mortality data means that the HLI can be used for reliable comparisons of wellbeing across countries, in the past as well as the present. Another advantage of the HLI is that it can be calculated even when information about education and economic wellbeing is not available. By evaluating the wellbeing in selected countries over time, the researchers show that the behavior of the HLI reflects the major political and economic events across the world in the last century, for example the world wars in European countries, or the Vietnam war in Asia. A conference organized jointly by IIASA and the UN between 25-26 February 2019 entitled “Measuring population ageing: Bridging research and policy” (http://www.iiasa.ac.at/web/home/research/researchPrograms/WorldPopulation/Meetings/190225-Re-aging.html) had the purpose to disseminate the new approaches in measuring ageing among policy makers, scientists, and media. It was a big success and recently UN asked us to contribute in the preparation of new measures of ageing for the new 2019 UN report on ageing. We also prepared a manuscript for Harvard University Press “Prospective Longevity: A New Vision of Population Ageing” that includes the major results of the Re-aging project. The book will be published in November 2019.
References:
Ghislandi S, Sanderson W, Scherbov S (2018) A Simple Measure of Human Development: The Human Life Indicator. Population and Development Review DOI: 10.1111/padr.12205 [pure.iiasa.ac.at/15370]
Sanderson, W.C. and S. Scherbov. (2013). “The Characteristics Approach to the Measurement of Population Aging.” Population and Development Review 39 (4): 673–85. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1728-4457.2013.00633.x.
Sanderson, W.C. and S. Scherbov. (2015). “Faster Increases in Human Life Expectancy Could Lead to Slower Population Aging.” PLoS ONE 10 (4): e0121922. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0121922.
Scherbov, S., and W.C. Sanderson (2016). New Approaches to the Conceptualization and Measurement of Age and Aging. Journal of Aging and Health 28 (7): 1159-1177. DOI:10.1177/0898264316656517.
Scherbov, S., and D. Weber. (2017). Future trends in the prevalence of severe activity limitations among older adults in Europe: a cross-national population study using EU-SILC. BMJ Open 7 (9): e017654. DOI:10.1136/bmjopen-2017-017654.
Sanderson, W.C. S. Scherbov, and P. Gerland. (2017). Probabilistic Population Aging. PLoS ONE 12 (6): e0179171. DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0179171.
References:
Ghislandi S, Sanderson W, Scherbov S (2018) A Simple Measure of Human Development: The Human Life Indicator. Population and Development Review DOI: 10.1111/padr.12205 [pure.iiasa.ac.at/15370]
Sanderson, W.C. and S. Scherbov. (2013). “The Characteristics Approach to the Measurement of Population Aging.” Population and Development Review 39 (4): 673–85. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1728-4457.2013.00633.x.
Sanderson, W.C. and S. Scherbov. (2015). “Faster Increases in Human Life Expectancy Could Lead to Slower Population Aging.” PLoS ONE 10 (4): e0121922. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0121922.
Scherbov, S., and W.C. Sanderson (2016). New Approaches to the Conceptualization and Measurement of Age and Aging. Journal of Aging and Health 28 (7): 1159-1177. DOI:10.1177/0898264316656517.
Scherbov, S., and D. Weber. (2017). Future trends in the prevalence of severe activity limitations among older adults in Europe: a cross-national population study using EU-SILC. BMJ Open 7 (9): e017654. DOI:10.1136/bmjopen-2017-017654.
Sanderson, W.C. S. Scherbov, and P. Gerland. (2017). Probabilistic Population Aging. PLoS ONE 12 (6): e0179171. DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0179171.