Impact of Human Settlement Environment on Aging Health in Rural Areas Based on Gender Differences
Lu Jiehua1,2, Sun Yang2
1.School of Population and Health, Renmin University of China, Beijing 100872, China 2.School of Ethnology and Sociology, Minzu University of China, Beijing 100081, China
Abstract：Living environment is a key factor in shaping the health behavior and status of the elderly. Against the background of deepening aging in rural areas, how to realize healthy aging and promote healthy equity in rural areas are important issues that need to be paid attention to in the national strategy of responding to population aging actively in China. However, existing researches on environmental health effects mainly focus on urban communities and elderly people in cities, while there is still a lack of research on the impact of rural environment on rural elderly people’s health. Meanwhile, gender difference is a fundamental perspective in gerontological research and public policy, yet most frameworks for studying the effects of living environment on older people’s health have only analyzed the average effects, with fewer studies examining these effects from the perspective of gender difference. Based on the five rounds of China Family Panel Studies from 2010 to 2018, this paper empirically analyzes the impact of rural settlement environment on aging health in rural china from the perspective of gender differences by a three-level linear development model.The main findings and conclusions of this paper are as follows. Overall, the health disadvantage of rural female elderly continues to accumulate over time. The rural settlement environment has a significant positive effect on the health of the elderly, which further demonstrates the important role of the environment in the theoretical framework of health promotion. It provides empirical evidence for promoting the improvement of rural infrastructure and ecological environment to improve the health level of the elderly in rural areas, so as to respond to the increasingly serious problem of population aging in rural areas with active and healthy rural actions. Additionally, due to physiological differences, gender division of labor, and aging-appropriate facilities without considering gender difference, the positive health effect of rural settlement environment has significant gender heterogeneity, which is specifically manifested in that the positive effect of rural settlement environment on the health of male elderly people is more significant than that of female elderly people. From the perspective of cross-layer interaction of multidimensional factors, the rural settlement environment can significantly narrow the gender difference in the health of the rural elderly. This finding not only indicates that elderly health in rural areas is the result of both internal individual factors and various macro external environmental elements working together, but also suggests that the rural living environment has the potential to mitigate gender inequalities in elderly health caused by differences in the socioeconomic factors among individuals. It thus provides valuable insights for how to solve the problem of health inequality among the elderly from the perspective of public policies.The above findings of this research provide empirical evidences and policy implications for improving the supply of health public services and products such as rural living environment and gender-friendly and aging-friendly environmental facilities, so as to realize healthy aging in rural areas and narrow health inequality among the elderly. In the future, it is necessary to increase the supply of public health services and products continuously, improve the modern public health governance systems, improve rural pension infrastructure, strengthen the comprehensive improvement and protection of rural ecological environment, improve the environmental awareness and environmental autonomy ability of rural elderly people, and shape their behavior and habits of healthy life. On the other hand, it is necessary to correctly understand the demographic characteristics in the process of rural aging and improve the situation through paying more attention to the gender difference in the health status of the elderly from the aspects of physiology, production and life, narrowing gender injustice in the policy process itself, refining the policies to respond to the differentiated needs of female elderly people, and enhancing the inclusiveness of public policies on aging health.
陆杰华, 孙杨. 性别差异视角下乡村人居环境对农村老龄健康的影响探究[J]. 浙江大学学报(人文社会科学版), 2025, 55(5): 5-18.
Lu Jiehua, Sun Yang. Impact of Human Settlement Environment on Aging Health in Rural Areas Based on Gender Differences. JOURNAL OF ZHEJIANG UNIVERSITY, 2025, 55(5): 5-18.
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