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Background. Lower socioeconomic status is associated with faster biological aging, the gradual and progressive decline in system integrity that accumulates with advancing age. Efforts to promote upward social mobility may therefore extend healthy lifespan. However, recent studies suggest that upward mobility may also have biological costs related to the stresses of crossing social boundaries. We characterize the impacts of social mobility on aging processes and assess heterogeneity by race and sex.
Methods. We analyzed cross-sectional data from 9286 participants in the 2016 Health and Retirement Study (HRS) Venous Blood Study. We quantified social mobility from childhood to later life in two ways: based on wealth accumulation in later life, and based on educational attainment. We quantified biological aging using three DNA methylation "clocks" and three blood-chemistry algorithms. Using linear regression, we tested associations of social mobility with biological aging in older adulthood.
Results. We observed substantial social mobility among study participants. Participants who achieved upward social mobility each exhibited less-advanced/slower biological aging in later life. Associations of upward economic mobility with less-advanced/slower aging were consistent for DNA methylation and blood-chemistry measures of biological aging. A 25-percentile-rank upward move in socioeconomic status from childhood to mid-life was associated with 0.07-0.19 SDs of less-advanced/slower biological aging. Upward economic mobility showed similar returns to healthy aging by race and sex, but upward educational mobility was less beneficial for Black as compared with White adults.
Conclusions. Upward economic mobility is associated with healthy aging processes. Further research is needed to examine countervailing mechanisms that may lead to smaller returns to education among Black adults.