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Sex Ratios in Old Age: Comparing Countries in Middle Eastern Asia to East and Southeast Asia

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Studies in the Sociology of Population

Abstract

This chapter analyses the elderly missing women phenomenon—masculinized sex ratios in the elderly population—in countries of Middle Eastern Asia and East and Southeast Asia . While many studies have explored the missing women phenomenon in East and Southeast Asia, Middle Eastern Asia, where the extent of the female deficit is worse, has mostly been neglected. Further, even in East and Southeast Asia the problem has mostly been studied at young ages. Countries forming both regions display different facets of the elderly missing women phenomenon, with some countries displaying it as a cohort effect only (e.g. Malaysia in Southeast Asia and Lebanon in Middle Eastern Asia) while others exhibit it in the total population as well (e.g. China in East Asia and Qatar in Middle Eastern Asia). This chapter further shows that in light of the rapid demographic transition of countries in these regions, it is imperative to change the focus of this issue from younger to older age groups in East and Southeast Asia and to place greater emphasis on studying the phenomenon in Middle Eastern Asia.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For a detailed discussion of existing explanations and potential causes, see Ezdi (2017).

  2. 2.

    All population projections for 2050 are based on United Nations medium variant estimates.

  3. 3.

    Unfortunately, subtracting immigrants by five-year age groups for these countries unveils data limitations, with major fluctuations in number that no longer allow for a clear interpretation. Consequently, this chapter only presents the results for these countries with the inclusion of immigrants.

  4. 4.

    Countries include: Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and UAE. These are recipients of migrants.

  5. 5.

    For example, in the case of mortality in Syria, Price et al. (2014) estimate that from March 2011 to April 2014, 191,396 Syrian deaths were documented with 85.1% of these deaths being male, 9.3% female and the sex of the remaining deaths being unknown. Further, the ages of 83.8% of these deaths were unrecorded (UN 2014), making it impossible to calculate accurately the sex ratios by age.

  6. 6.

    According to the UNHCR (2016), there were approximately 4.8 million registered Syrian refugees with 50.2% of these being male and 49.8% being female. The majority were concentrated in the 18–59 age category.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Turku, Turku, Finland

    Sehar Ezdi

  2. University of Vechta, Vechta, Germany

    Harald Künemund

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  1. Sehar Ezdi
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Correspondence to Sehar Ezdi .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Social Work, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beersheba, Israel

    Jon Anson

  2. Institute of Sociology, Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Halle, Germany

    Walter Bartl

  3. School of Public Health, University of Alabama Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, USA

    Andrzej Kulczycki

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Ezdi, S., Künemund, H. (2019). Sex Ratios in Old Age: Comparing Countries in Middle Eastern Asia to East and Southeast Asia. In: Anson, J., Bartl, W., Kulczycki, A. (eds) Studies in the Sociology of Population. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94869-0_6

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