Swedish Adoption/Twin Study on Aging (SATSA), 1984, 1987, 1990, 1993, 2004, 2007, and 2010 (ICPSR 3843)

Version Date: May 13, 2015

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Principal Investigator(s):
Nancy L. Pedersen, Karolinska Institutet (Sweden)

https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR03843.v2

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Summary

The Swedish Adoption/Twin Study on Aging (SATSA) was designed to study the origins of individual differences in aging and the environmental and genetic factors that are involved. SATSA began in 1984, and six additional waves were conducted in 1987, 1990, 1993, 2004, 2007, and 2010. The questionnaire was initially sent to all twins from the Swedish Twin Registry who were separated at an early age and raised apart; the survey was also administered to a control sample of twins who were raised together. The respondents were surveyed on items that included health status, how they were raised, work environment, alcohol consumption, and dietary and smoking habits, as well as questions about personality and attitudes; this information comprised the first component. The second component was collected from a subsample composed of 150 pairs of twins raised apart and 150 pairs of twins raised together. This subsample participated in seven waves of in-person testing, which included a health examination, structured interviews, and tests on functional capacity, cognitive abilities, and memory. The data are represented according to questionnaire and time number, and correspond to each wave/year: Questionnaire 1 and In-Person Testing Time 1 were in 1984; Questionnaire 2 and In-Person Testing Time 2 were in 1987; Questionnaire 3 and In-Person Testing Time 3 were in 1990; Questionnaire 4 and In-Person Testing Time 4 were in 1993; Questionnaire 5 was in 2003; In-Person Testing Time 5 was in 2004; Questionnaire 6 and In-Person Testing Time 6 were in 2007; In-Person Testing Time 7 was in 2010. The Administrative and Cognitive datasets include data from all years/waves. The Smell Survey dataset only includes data from 1990. No years were specified for the Contact measures and Separation measures datasets. Demographic and background information includes age, sex, education, family history, household composition and employment.

Citation

Pedersen, Nancy L. Swedish Adoption/Twin Study on Aging (SATSA), 1984, 1987, 1990, 1993, 2004, 2007, and 2010. Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2015-05-13. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR03843.v2

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Funding

John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Research Network on Successful Aging, United States Department of Health and Human Services. National Institutes of Health. National Institute on Aging (AG04563, AG10175, AG08724), Swedish Research Council (825-2007-7460, 825-2009-6141, 825-3011-6182), Swedish Council for Working Life and Social Research (97:0147:1B, 2009-0795)

Subject Terms

ability   activities of daily living   adopted children   adoption   aging   alcohol consumption   allergies   anxiety   associations   attitudes   caregivers   chronic disabilities   chronic illnesses   conflict   cultural attitudes   cultural traditions   death   death of spouse   dementia   demographic characteristics   demography   diabetes   diet   disabilities   disease   eating habits   education   educational background   emotional problems   employment   environment   everyday life   eyesight   families   family conflict   family histories   family history   family life   family relationships   family structure   food   friendships   health   health problems   health status   hearing aids   home care   home environment   hostility   household composition   housework   illness   injuries   leisure   life events   lifestyles   living arrangements   living conditions   long term care   management   medicine   memory   mental health   miscarriages   occupations   older adults   opinions   optimism   pain   parents   personality   pessimism   physical appearance   physical characteristics   physical condition   physical limitations   population characteristics   populations   prescription drugs   psychological wellbeing   recreation   relatives   retirement   retirement planning   retirement plans   risk   risk assessment   risk factors   siblings   smoking   socioeconomic status   stillbirths   testing and measurement   twins   work   work attitudes   work environment   workplaces

Geographic Coverage

Smallest Geographic Unit

county

Restrictions

ICPSR has recoded the responses for several string variables to missing in order to prevent disclosure risk. Users interested in obtaining the verbatim responses should contact the Director of the National Archive of Computerized Data on Aging, James McNally at jmcnally@umich.edu.

Distributor(s)

Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research
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Time Period(s)

1984 -- 2010

Date of Collection

1984 -- 2010

Data Collection Notes

  1. This collection only contains data up through the year 2010, which goes through Questionnaire 7 and IPT7.

  2. The datasets in this collection can be linked by the variable TWINNR.

  3. The data, setup files, and documentation for this collection contain characters with diacritical marks used in the Swedish language. Additionally, several string responses contain suspicious characters which were not addressed by ICPSR.

  4. This collection has been minimally processed by ICSPR and users will need to refer to the SATSA Codebooks for each corresponding dataset for details such as question text.

  5. Additional information about SATSA can be found at the Karolinska Institutet Web site (Swedish) or the Karolinska Institutet Web site (English).

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Study Purpose

The purpose is to study various aspects of aging; the relative importance of genetic and environmental factors for individual differences in aging, especially in cognitive and physical domains. A further main focus is to study changes within and across domains and which genetic and life style factors predict these changes.

Study Design

SATSA was started in 1984 and is comprised of several longitudinal components. To begin with, a comprehensive questionnaire was sent to all twins in the Swedish Twin Registry who were separated at an early age and reared apart, and a control sample of twins reared together. The questionnaires for the first component are composed of items concerning rearing, family, adult, and working environment, health status, health related behaviors (e.g. alcohol, tobacco, and dietary habits) as well as relationships, and personality measures. The questionnaires were sent again at three-year intervals in 1987, 1990, 1993, and after a break again in 2004, 2007, and 2010. Thus far, more than 2,000 twins have responded to at least one of the seven questionnaire assessments conducted between 1984 and 2010. In the second component a subsample of 861 individuals have participated in at least one wave of in-person testing (IPT). The IPT for the second component is composed of a health examination, structured interviews, tests of functional capacity, and memory and thinking abilities.

Sample

All surviving persons from twin pairs that were raised apart and the matched sample of twins that were raised together. Please refer to the Administrative, Scales and Derived Variables SATSA Codebook for additional information about sampling.

Time Method

Longitudinal

Universe

All pairs of twins from the Swedish Twin Registry who said that they were separated before the age of 10 and raised apart and twins that were raised together and were matched by gender, date, and county of birth.

Unit(s) of Observation

individual

Data Type(s)

Mode of Data Collection

Response Rates

Thus far more than 2,000 twins have responded to at least one of the seven questionnaire assessments conducted between 1984 and 2010. In the second component a subsample of 861 individuals have participated in at least one wave of in-person testing (IPT). To date, over 76 percent of the sample has participated in 3 or more measurement waves. Please refer to the Administrative, Scales and Derived Variables SATSA Codebook for additional information about response rates.

Presence of Common Scales

Please refer to the SATSA Codebooks for datasets 16-27, 28-30, 31-32, 33-35, 36-39, 40-45, 46-48, and 49-51 for information about scales.

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Original Release Date

2005-01-27

Version History

2018-02-15 The citation of this study may have changed due to the new version control system that has been implemented. The previous citation was:
  • Pedersen, Nancy L. Swedish Adoption/Twin Study on Aging (SATSA), 1984, 1987, 1990, 1993, 2004, 2007, and 2010. ICPSR03843-v2. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2015-05-13. http://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR03843.v2

2015-05-13 Data and documentation for 2004, 2007, and 2010 have been added. All data and documentation have been updated.

2005-01-27 ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:

  • Standardized missing values.
  • Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.
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Weight

The data are not weighted and no weight variables are present in the collection.

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Notes

  • The public-use data files in this collection are available for access by the general public. Access does not require affiliation with an ICPSR member institution.

NACDA logo

This study is maintained and distributed by the National Archive of Computerized Data on Aging (NACDA), the aging program within ICPSR. NACDA is sponsored by the National Institute on Aging (NIA) at the National Institutes of Heath (NIH).