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Modal age at death: lifespan indicator in the era of longevity extension

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  • Shiro Horiuchi
  • Nadine Ouellette
  • Siu Lan Karen Cheung
  • Jean-Marie Robine

Abstract

This paper examines and demonstrates the importance of the adult modal age at death (M) in longevity research. Unlike life expectancy at birth (e0) and median age at death, M is determined solely by old-age mortality as far as mortality follows a bathtub curve. It represents the location of old-age death heap in the age distribution of deaths, and captures mortality shifts more accurately than conditional life expectancies such as e65. Although M may not be directly determined from erratic mortality data, a recently developed method for deriving M from the P-spline-smoothed mortality curve based on penalised Poisson likelihood is highly effective in estimating M. Patterns of trends and differentials in M can be noticeably different from those in other lifespan measures, as indicated in some examples. In addition, major mathematical models of adult mortality such as the Gompertz, logistic and Weibull models can be reformulated using M, which plays a critical role as the mortality level parameter in those models.

Suggested Citation

  • Shiro Horiuchi & Nadine Ouellette & Siu Lan Karen Cheung & Jean-Marie Robine, 2013. "Modal age at death: lifespan indicator in the era of longevity extension," Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, Vienna Institute of Demography (VID) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, vol. 11(1), pages 37-69.
    • Handle: RePEc:vid:yearbk:v:11:y:2013:i:1:p:37-69
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    5. Elena Demuru & Viviana Egidi, 2016. "Adjusting prospective old-age thresholds by health status: empirical findings and implications. A case study of Italy," Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, Vienna Institute of Demography (VID) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, vol. 14(1), pages 131-154.
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    7. Jonas Šiaulys & Rokas Puišys, 2022. "Survival with Random Effect," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-17, March.
    8. Konstantinos N. Zafeiris, 2023. "Greece since the 1960s: the mortality transition revisited: a joinpoint regression analysis," Journal of Population Research, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 1-31, March.
    9. Paola Vazquez-Castillo & Trifon Missov & Marie-Pier Bergeron-Boucher, 2024. "Longevity à la mode: A discretized derivative tests method for accurate estimation of the adult modal age at death," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 50(11), pages 325-346.
    10. Bergeron-Boucher, Marie-Pier & Vázquez-Castillo, Paola & Missov, Trifon, 2022. "A modal age at death approach to forecasting mortality," SocArXiv 5zr2k, Center for Open Science.
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