Page 99 - IJPS-11-4

International Journal of
Population Studies Health disparities and older adults well-being in China

factor in depression within Chinese society, despite some has a statistically significant positive effect on the mental
literature indicating otherwise. Given the significant health of the older persons.
disparity between urban and rural areas in China (Jiang et In addition, we observed that compared to the reference
al., 2021), our empirical results indicate that compared to group (“rural residence with urban household registration”),
the older people living in cities, those living in rural areas are
more prone to depression. Both the explanatory variables the coefficient for the mental health of the older ages who
“gender” and “married” have a statistically significant fall in the category “rural household registration but live in
positive effect on CESD, implying that males tend to have urban area” indicates that their mental health condition is
better mental health than females, and that married older better, although there is no statistically significant evidence
adults enjoy better mental health than unmarried ones. for this observation. This group, consisting of older people
Except for the older adults who did not complete primary temporarily living in cities, benefits from superior services
education, higher educational levels are associated with such as convenient infrastructure and high-quality medical
lower CESD scores and lower levels of depression. In terms resources. However, despite facing fewer obstacles in
of household location, our empirical results indicate two accessing medical care, they still harbor concerns about the
distinct trends among older-aged groups. One trend is cost of medical care since they are not covered by the urban
that having a rural household registration and currently medical insurance system. This discrepancy could explain
living in a rural area has a statistically significant negative why the coefficient of the variable for them is positive but
effect on the mental health of the older people. Conversely, lacks statistical significance. Furthermore, we identified
having an urban household registration and living in a city a statistically significant positive effect on mental health

Table 3. Estimated results concerning mental health (Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale‑10)
Variables Model 3 Model 4
Coefficient SE Coefficient SE
Age 0.059 0.124 0.014 0.120
Age square −0.000 0.001 0.000 0.001
Gender 1.527 0.136*** 1.369 0.132***
Married 0.969 0.480** 0.770 0.468*
One-person household −0.361 0.457 −0.557 0.446
Education level
Illiterate (reference)
Did not finish primary school 0.110 0.191 −0.298 0.187
Elementary school 0.894 0.195*** 0.355 0.192*
Middle school 1.592 0.210*** 0.973 0.206***
High school 2.262 0.256*** 1.636 0.251***
College degree and above 2.948 0.541*** 2.192 0.528***
Household location
Rural residence with urban household registration (reference)
Urban residence with rural household registration (1,1) 0.465 0.338 0.422 0.329
Urban residence with urban household registration (1,0) 0.871 0.309*** 0.791 0.301***
Rural residence with rural household registration (0,1) −0.756 0.285*** −0.646 0.278**
Communist Party of China member 0.390 0.207* 0.343 0.202*
Having savings 1.110 0.133*** 0.823 0.130***
Living in the Yangtze River Delta or Pearl River Delta districts 1.909 0.213*** 1.592 0.208***
Instrumental activities of daily living 3.784 0.162***
Constant 16.423 4.214*** 14.577 4.109***
Number of observations 10,504 10,502
Adjusted R squared 0.095 0.139
Notes: ***Statistical significance at the 1% level. **Statistical significance at the 5% level. *Statistical significance at the 10% level.

Volume 11 Issue 4 (2025) 93 https://doi.org/10.36922/ijps.2035