Adult Childrens’ College Completion Timing and Their Aging Mothers’ Self-Rated Health: The Role of Mothers’ Educational Attainment

The transition to adulthood has become delayed, with college completion often diverging by socioeconomic background, specifically maternal education. On time, late, or never completing college can have health ramifications that reverberate into the lives of aging mothers. Using dyadic data from Waves I, III, IV, and V of Add Health and Waves I and II of Add Health Parent Study, we used logistic regression to assess whether the adult childrens’ college timing completion was associated with their aging mothers’ self-rated health. We also considered variation by mothers’ educational attainment. Results showed adult childrens’ college completion, whether on time or late, was associated with better maternal self-rated health relative to having adult children who did not complete college. We found no evidence that college completion timing and mothers’ self-rated health varied by mothers’ educational attainment.