Abstract
Prior research on mortality for U.S. blacks focuses on the detrimental effects of minority concentration and residential segregation in metropolitan areas on health outcomes. To date, few studies have examined this relationship outside of large U.S. central cities. In this paper, we extend current research on the minority concentration and mortality relationship to explain the rural advantage in mortality for nonmetropolitan blacks. Using data from the 1986–1994 linked National Health Interview Survey/National Death Index, we examine the rural-urban gap in mortality for U.S. blacks. Our findings indicate that blacks in nonmetropolitan areas experience a lower risk of mortality than metropolitan central city blacks after indicators of socio-economic and health status are controlled. Our findings also point to the importance of accounting for contextual factors. Net of individual level controls, minority concentration exerts differential effects across metropolitan and nonmetropolitan areas, such that nonmetropolitan black residents experience a lower risk of mortality in high minority concentration areas than blacks in metropolitan central city areas. This finding suggests a reconceptualization of the meaning for minority concentration with respect to studies of health outcomes in nonmetropolitan communities.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Allison, P.D. (1984). Event history analysis: Regression for longitudinal event data. New York: Sage University Press.
Anderson, E. (1999). Code of the street: Decency, violence, and the moral life of the inner city. New York: W.W. Norton.
Beggs, J.J., Haines, V. & Hurlbert, J. (1996). Revisiting the rural-urban contrast: Personal networks in nonmetropolitan and metropolitan settings, Rural Sociology 61(2): 306–326.
Blalock, H.M. (1956). Economic discrimination and Negro increase, American Sociological Review 21: 584–588.
Cassirer, N. (1996). Race composition and earnings: Effects by race, region, and gender, Social Science Research 25(4): 375–399.
Clifford, W.B. & Brannon, Y.S. (1985). Rural-urban differentials in mortality, Rural Sociology 50: 210–224.
Dollard, J. (1937). Caste and class in a Southern town. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Duncan, C. (1999). World's apart: Why poverty persists in rural America. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Eggebeen, D.J. & Lichter, D. (1993). Health and well-being among rural Americans: Variations across the life course, Journal of Rural Health 7: 153–169.
Falk, W.W. & Lyson, T.A. (1988). High tech, low tech, no tech: Recent industrial and occupational change in the South. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
Fligstein, N. (1981). Going North: Migration of blacks and whites from the South 1900–1950. New York: Academic Press.
Fossett, M.A. & Seibert, M.T. (1997). Long time coming: Racial inequality in the nonmetropolitan South, 1940–1990. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Geronimus, A.T., Bound, J., Waidman, T.A., Colen, C. & Steffick, D. (2001). Inequality in life expectancy, functional status, and active life expectancy across selected black and white populations in the United States, Demography 38(2): 227–251.
Glenn, N.D. (1964). The relative size of the Negro population and Negro
Glenn, N.D. (1966). White gains from Negro subordination, Social Problems 14: 159–178.
Hart, K.D, Kunitz, S. & Sell, R. (1998). Metropolitan governance, residential segregation, and mortality among African Americans, American Journal of Public Health 88: 434–438.
Hayward, M.D., Pienta, A. & McLaughlin, D. (1997). Inequality in men's mortality: The socioeconomic status gradient and geographic context, Journal of Health and Social Behavior 38(December): 313–330.
Hurlbert, J.S. & Bankston, W. (1998). Cultural distinctiveness in the face of structural transformation: The ‘new’ old South, pp. 168–188 in D. Hart (ed.), The Rural South Since World War II. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press.
Jackson, S.A., Anderson, R., Johnson, N. & Sorlie, P. (2000). The relation of residential segregation to all-cause mortality: A study in black and white, American Journal of Public Health 90(4): 615–617.
Krivo, L.J. & Peterson, R. (2000). The structural context of homicide: Accounting for differences in process, American Sociological Review 65(4): 547–559.
LaVeist, T.A. (1989). Linking residential segregation to the infant mortality race disparity in U.S. cities, Social Science Research 73: 90–94.
LaVeist, T.A. (1992). The political empowerment and health status of African Americans: Mapping a new territory, American Journal of Sociology 97(4): 1080–1095.
LeClere, F.B., Rogers, R. & Peters, K. (1997). Ethnicity and mortality in the United States: Individual and community correlates, Social Forces 76(1): 169–198.
Lieberson, S. (1980). A piece of the pie: Blacks and American immigrants since 1980. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Lyson, T.A., Torres, R. & Welsh, R. (2001). Scale of agricultural production, civic engagement, and community welfare, Social Forces 80(1): 311–328.
Massey, D.S. & Denton, N. (1993). American apartheid: Segregation and the making of the underclass. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Massey, D.S., Gross, A. & Eggers, M. (1991). Segregation, the concentration of poverty, and the life chances of individuals, Social Science Research 20: 397–420.
McLaughlin, D.K. & Stokes, C.S. (2002). Income inequality and mortality in U.S. counties: Does minority concentration matter? American Journal of Public Health 92(1): 99–104.
McLaughlin, D.K., Stokes, C.S. & Nonoyama, A. (2001). Residence and income inequality: Effects on mortality among U.S. counties, Rural Sociology 66(4): 579–598.
National Center for Health Statistics (2000). National health interview survey: Multiple cause of death public use data file: 1986–1997 Survey years. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics.
National Center for Health Statistics (2002). Health, United States 2002 with chartbook on trends in the health of Americans. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics.
Patterson, B.H. & Bilgrade, R. (1986). Use of the national death index in cancer studies, Journal of the National Cancer Institute 77: 877–881.
Peterson, R.D., Krivo, L. & Harris, M. (2000). Disadvantage and neighborhood violent crime: Do local institutions matter? Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 37(1): 31–63.
Poldenak, A.P. (1991). Black-white differences in infant mortality in 38 standard metropolitan statistical areas, American Journal of Public Health 81(11): 1480–1482.
Poldenak, A.P. (1996). Trends in U.S. urban black infant mortality by degree of residential segregation, American Journal of Public Health 86(5): 723–726.
Raibner, D.J. (1995). Patterns and predictors of noninstitutional health care utilization by older adults in rural and urban America, Journal of Rural Health 11: 259–273.
Rogers, R. G., Hummer, R. & Nam, C. (2000). Living and dying in the USA: Behavioral, health, and social differentials of adult mortality. New York: Academic Press.
Sampson, R.J. (1987). Urban black violence: The effect of male joblessness and family disruption, American Journal of Sociology 93: 348–382.
Santoro, W.A. (1995). Black politics and employment policies: The determinants of local government affirmative action, Social Science Quarterly 76(4): 794–806.
Shah, B., Barnwell, B.G. & Bieler, G. (1997). SUDAAN user's manual, release 8. Research Triangle Park, NC: Research Triangle Institute.
Shihadeh, E.S. & Ousey, G. (1998). Industrial restructuring and violence: The link between entry-level jobs, economic deprivation, and black and white homicide, Social Forces 77(1): 185–201.
Stearns, L.B. & Logan, J. (1986). The racial structuring of the housing market and segregation in suburban areas, Social Forces 65(1): 28–42.
U.S.Department of Health & Human Services. (1990). International classification of diseases, 3rd edition, 9th revision, volume 1. Washington, D.C.: USGPO.
Villemez, W.J. & Beggs, J. (1984). Black capitalism and black inequality: Some sociological considerations, Social Forces 63(1): 117–144.
Waitzman, N.J. & Smith, K. (1998). Separate but lethal: The effects of economic segregation on mortality in metropolitan America, Milbank Quarterly 76(3): 341–374.
Wilson, W.J. (1987). The truly disadvantaged: The inner-city, underclass, and public policy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Young, F.W. & Lyson, T. (2001). Structural pluralism and all-cause mortality, American Journal of Public Health 91(1): 136–138.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Blanchard, T.C., Cossman, J.S. & Levin, M.L. Multiple Meanings of Minority Concentration: Incorporating Contextual Explanations into the Analysis of Individual-Level U.S. Black Mortality Outcomes. Population Research and Policy Review 23, 309–326 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1023/B:POPU.0000034080.72592.42
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/B:POPU.0000034080.72592.42