Barbara Entwisle

How do life-course events and roles affect internal migration in young adulthood in the United States? Building on and extending existing explanations, the authors proposes that life-course events typically disrupt lives, increasing mobility, whereas the roles that subsequently follow tend to tie people to place. Using monthly data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997, the authors empirically distinguish between life-course events and roles in young adulthood across work, education, marital, and parental domains and assess the effects of each on interstate moves. The findings show that events and roles have opposing effects within life-course domains and in a similar pattern across domains, indicating that their effects not only are due to domain-specific factors but also reflect a set of larger principles across domains. The findings also demonstrate the importance of accounting for events and roles in combination rather than in isolation of each other.

The collection of race and ethnicity information varies across data sources which impacts our ability to conduct high quality research focused on population health, generally, and racial and ethnic disparities in health, specifically. This research examines concordance in racial/ethnic identification between two sources by linking individual-level electronic health record (EHR) data (2017–2019) from a public integrated health delivery system in North Carolina to American Community Survey (ACS) microdata (2001–2017). We find that concordance is high for individuals who identify as non-Hispanic Black, non-Hispanic White, and Hispanic but considerably lower for other non-White, non-Hispanic individuals, particularly for American Indian and Alaska Native patients. Given their detailed health information, EHR data have the potential to support research focused on population health and racial and ethnic disparities. Results from this study provide information regarding data quality and future applications of this work to expand population research.

The use of data derived from electronic health records (EHRs) to describe racial and ethnic health disparities is increasingly common, but there are challenges. While the number of patients covered by EHRs can be quite large, such patients may not be representative of a source population. One way to evaluate the extent of this limitation is by linking EHRs to an external source, in this case with the American Community Survey (ACS). Relying on a stratified random sample of about 200,000 patient records from a large, public, integrated health delivery system in North Carolina (2016–2019), we assess linkages to restricted ACS microdata (2001–2017) by race and ethnicity to understand the strengths and weaknesses of EHR-derived data for describing disparities. The results in this research note suggest that Black–White comparisons will benefit from standard adjustments (e.g., weighting procedures) but that misestimation of health disparities may arise for Hispanic patients because of differential coverage rates for this group.

Objectives. To assess linkages of patient data from a health care system in the southeastern United States to microdata from the American Community Survey (ACS) with the goal of better understanding health disparities and social determinants of health in the population. Methods. Once a data use agreement was in place, a stratified random sample of approximately 200 000 was drawn of patients aged 25 to 74 years with at least 2 visits between January 1, 2016, and December 31, 2019. Information from the sampled electronic health records (EHRs) was transferred securely to the Census Bureau, put through the Census Person Identification Validation System to assign Protected Identification Keys (PIKs) as unique identifiers wherever possible. EHRs with PIKs assigned were then linked to 2001–2017 ACS records with a PIK. Results. PIKs were assigned to 94% of the sampled patients. Of patients with PIKs, 15.5% matched to persons sampled in the ACS. Conclusions. Linking data from EHRs to ACS records is feasible and, with adjustments for differential coverage, will advance understanding of social determinants and enhance the ability of integrated delivery systems to reflect and affect the health of the populations served. (Am J Public Health. 2022;112(6):923–930. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2022.306783 )

Over the past two decades, population researchers have engaged in a far-reaching and productive program of research on demographic responses to changes in the natural environment. This essay “looks back” to the origins of these developments, identifying pivotal agenda-setting moments in the 1990s and tracing the impact on contemporary research. The essay also “looks forward” to identify critical gaps and challenges that remain to be addressed and to set an agenda for future research on population responses to environmental change. It recommends that the multidimensionality of environmental contexts and change be fully embraced, long run as well as short term effects be investigated, variability in the effects of environmental change in relation to social institutions, policy implementation, and environmental context be examined, movement between contexts as well as change in situ as sources of environmental change be considered, and interconnections among demographic processes in response to environmental change be explored. Taking these steps will position demographers to contribute significantly to a larger and deeper understanding of environmental change and its consequences, locally, regionally, and globally.

Do life course events stimulate migration during the transition to adulthood? We identify nine specific life events in the family, education, and employment domains and test whether they lead to migration in the short term, using fixed-effects models that remove the influence of all stable individual-level characteristics and controlling for age. Marital and school completion events have substantively large effects on migration compared with individual work transitions, although there are more of the latter over the young adult years. Furthermore, young adults who are white and from higher class backgrounds are more likely to migrate in response to life events, suggesting that migration may be a mechanism for the reproduction of status attainment. Overall, the results demonstrate a close relationship between life course events and migration and suggest a potential role for migration in explaining the effect of life course events on well-being and behavior.

Social science is at a pivotal moment. The advent of “big data” from the Internet, social media, and smartphones as well as newly available administrative data from electronic sources has opened the door to new understandings of people and society. That said, realizing this promise requires a vision for the future and a practical plan for reaching it. The articles in this volume begin this work. Each addresses some aspect of data linkage. Each can be considered a patch in a time-place mosaic. This concluding article considers the articles as a collection and how they might be quilted together. It discusses the diversity of sources available, differences in time depth and sociospatial coverage, and the many challenges of using data not designed for research. It identifies the benefits that would cumulate as a set of regional data centers to assemble, link, curate, and share diverse data sources is established and coordinated. These data centers could provide the combination of national coverage, local depth, and temporal precision needed to advance our understanding of the American population.