Background: The percentage of older adults in the United States reporting being in good health has increased since the 1980s. Objective: This study tries to explain long-term trends in self-rated health in the United States. Methods: We used 47 years of repeated cross-sectional data from the National Health Interview Survey to estimate regression models that predict trends in self-rated health. Results: Our results show that the improvement in self-rated health of men as well as women aged 50–84 is largely explained by gains in educational attainment. Self-rated health has slightly improved among those with post-secondary education, while it did not improve among those without post-secondary education. Contribution: This study is one of the few to try to explain long-term trends in self-rated health. It does so for a much longer period of time than any previous study.

中文翻译：

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1972-2018年，教育在解释美国自我评估健康趋势方面的作用

背景：自1980年代以来，美国报告称身体健康的老年人比例有所增加。目的：本研究试图解释美国自我评估健康的长期趋势。方法：我们使用了来自美国国家健康访问调查的47年的重复横截面数据来估计预测自我评估健康趋势的回归模型。结果：我们的结果表明，男性和50-84岁女性的自我评价健康状况的改善在很大程度上是受教育程度提高的原因。大专学历者的自我评价健康状况略有改善，而大专学历者的自我评价健康状况却没有改善。贡献：这项研究是尝试解释自我评估健康的长期趋势的少数研究之一。