Continuity and Change in Pathways to Young AdultDisadvantage: Results from a British Birth Cohort

This paper focuses on pathways to adult disadvantage (or social exclusion) up toage 33 for a cohort of children born in Great Britain in March 1958. A sequenceof interrelated analyses that build up a life-course account of the pathwaysinvolved in the origins of adult social exclusion are explored.The first set of results concern the associations of childhood disadvantage tosubsequent adult disadvantage and pay particular attention to whether thepathways involved or the responsiveness to childhood circumstances differ bygender. We also provide a consistent account of the pervasive childhood factors,that are associated with a wide range of adult disadvantage for both men andwomen, and the specific antecedents, that show fewer but related links acrosssimilar domains of life-course experience. A sub-theme is an exploration of thesensitivity of the results to selection through missing information on the sameadult outcome at the other adult age. We find fairly compelling evidence thatthe effects of childhood disadvantage are more powerful for women than formen: pathways to social exclusion are gendered.[...]