Low Birthweight and Maternal Education is the Subject of New Study by Martinson and Co-authors
Posted: 5/2/2024 (CSDE Research)
CSDE Affiliate Melissa L. Martinson (Social Work) released an article with co-authors in SSM – Population Health, entitled “Gradients in low birthweight by maternal education: a comparative perspective“. Longstanding research has shown strong inequalities in low birthweight by household income. However, most such research has focused on Anglophone countries, while evidence emerging from other developed countries suggest a stronger role of education rather than incomes in creating inequalities at birth. This paper compares gradients in low birthweight by maternal education, as well as explores underlying mechanisms contributing to these gradients, in France, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Using decomposition analysis we found that while inequalities in low birth weight across maternal education groups were relatively similar in the United States, the United Kingdom and France, the individual-level mechanisms producing such inequalities varied substantially across the three countries, with income being most important in the US, pregnancy smoking being most evident in France, and the UK occupying an intermediate position. Essentially, maternal education appears to produce inequalities in low birth weight in the US through income differences, but this is not the case in the other countries examined.