Primary Submission Category: Aging
Not All Sandwiches are Created Equal: Health Disparities and Heterogenous Sandwich Generation Experiences
Authors: Kent Jason Cheng
Presenting Author: Kent Jason Cheng*
The term ‘sandwich generation’ typically refers to middle-aged individuals who are responsible for caring for both their underage children and aging parents simultaneously. Although the media often suggests that being sandwiched between two generations can have negative consequences, there is little research that has quantified the types, magnitudes, and direction of intergenerational exchanges within these families and their resulting health. To address these gaps, this study used the Panel Study of Income Dynamics Rosters and Transfers module to investigate health disparities by typologies of sandwich generation created using latent class analysis on time and money transfers (1) to and from parents and (2) to and from children. Preliminary results revealed four types, in ascending order of exchange frequency: (1) low probabilities of providing time to parents and money to adult children (prevalence=21.5%), (2) slightly higher compared to previous type but almost equal probabilities of providing time to parents and money to adult children (22.0%), (3) intense time and money transfers to adult children (34.8%), (4) intense time and money to both adult children and parents (21.7%). Logistic regression controlling for age, sex, and race-ethnicity revealed that while there were no statistically significant differences in terms of reporting fair/ poor health and having two or more chronic illnesses by sandwich types, the type with most intense time and money transfers to both parents and children had 2.4x higher odds of reporting distress compared to the group with least transfers.