This study examines the changing relationship between education and HIV in Africa over time. While a negative relationship between education and morbi…

In many modern populations, grandparents are increasingly becoming the primary caregivers of their grandchildren. This phenomenon has renewed interest in the role that grandparents play in within-fam...

In many modern populations, grandparents are increasingly becoming the primary caregivers of their grandchildren. This phenomenon has renewed interest in the role that grandparents play in within-fam...

Please use this form to register for the IPUMs International Session hosted by the Historical Economic Demography Group at LSE. The session will be on Zoom from 15:15-16:30 UK Time on 12 November 202...

Globally, women perform the lion’s share of domestic labor. Research indicates that gender disparities in cognitive labor—the “thinking work” required to antici...

This cohort study examines the association between first-trimester exposure to messenger RNA (mRNA) COVID-19 vaccines and the risk of major congenital malformations among infants in France.

After nearly 2 years of war and severe restrictions in humanitarian aid, tens of thousands of preschool-aged children in the Gaza Strip are suffering from preventable acute malnutrition and facing an ...

How we remember our past can be shaped by the realities of our present. This study examines how changes to present circumstances influence retrospective reports of family income rank at age 16. While retrospective survey data can be used to assess the long-term effects of childhood conditions, present-day circumstances may “anchor” memories, causing shifts in how individuals recall and report past experiences. Using panel data from the 2006–2014 General Social Surveys (8,602 observations from 2,883 individuals in the United States), we analyze how changes in objective and subjective indicators of current social status—income, financial satisfaction, and perceived income relative to others—are associated with changes in reports of childhood income rank, and how this varies by sex and race/ethnicity. Fixed-effects models reveal no significant association between changes in income and in childhood income rank. However, changes in subjective measures of social status show contrasting effects, as increases in current financial satisfaction are associated with decreases in childhood income rank, but increases in current perceived relative income are associated with increases in childhood income rank. We argue these opposing effects follow from theories of anchoring in recall bias. We further find these effects are stronger among males but are consistent across racial/ethnic groups. This demographic heterogeneity suggests that recall bias is not evenly distributed across the population and has important implications for how different groups perceive their own pasts. Our findings further highlight the malleability of retrospective perceptions and their sensitivity to current social conditions, offering methodological insights into survey reliability and recall bias.

There is a widespread belief, in both the scholarly literature and the popular press, that polygyny prevents large numbers of men from marrying by ...