The Gateway is seeking submissions for a symposium at the 2024 Annual Meeting of the Gerontological Society of America (GSA) in Seattle, Washington from November 13 to 16, 2024.

The session, titled "Health Impacts of the Social and Physical Environment in Global and Cross-National Studies", is soliciting presentations of papers that leverage Harmonized datafiles from one or more countries.

Submit your 250-word abstract here by February 26, 2024.

We are pleased to announce an updated to the Harmonized Mex-Cog data. Version A.2 includes several new demographic variables and variable name and label adjustments to maintain comparability with other Harmonized HCAP datasets.

The dataset is available for download from the MHAS website.

We are excited to announce the launch of the Gateway to Global Aging Data Enclave. The Gateway's Data Enclave is a secure remote-access computing desktop hosted on the National Institute on Aging's LINKAGE platform. Through the Enclave, users are provided access to the Gateway's Harmonized data products and original survey data. The Enclave also provides users with analytic packages like R, SAS, and Stata and productivity software like Adobe Acrobat Reader, Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Word, and Notepad++.

More information is available on our Enclave page.

The Health and Retirement Study (HRS) is hosting a virtual workshop from December 4-6 on Life History Data in the HRS.

The workshop will give an overview of the life history data resources in the HRS, with a special focus on the Life History Mail Survey, which was fielded in 2015, 2017, and 2019 and obtains detailed retrospective residential, educational, occupational, and partnership histories of HRS participant prior to age 50. The workshop will also feature the Harmonized Life History datasets and include an example analysis using the Harmonized SHARE Life History dataset.

Register by November 27, 2023. For more information, or to register, please see here.

Monday, November 13 at 8:00 AM LA / 11:00 AM NY / 4:00 PM London / 9:30 PM New Delhi

This webinar will highlight a recent project from the USC/UCLA Center on Biodemography and Population Health (CBPH) that harmonized four blood-based biomarkers (C-reactive protein (CRP), glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1c), and total (TC) and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol) across population-based health surveys in the United States (HRS, MIDUS), England (ELSA), Ireland (TILDA), Northern Ireland (NICOLA), China (CHARLS), India (LASI, LASI-DAD), Indonesia (IFLS), and Brazil (ELSI). Join our webinar to learn more about how the harmonization was conducted and how to get started using harmonized biomarker data to conduct more valid cross-study/cross-country comparative research.

Register here.

The UC Berkeley Center on the Economics and Demography of Aging (CEDA) and the USC/UCLA Center on Biodemography and Population Health (CBPH) are seeking submissions for the 2024 Workshop on Determinants of Adult Mortality, Morbidity, and Healthy Aging in LMICs.

The Workshop, held virtually on Friday, February 23, 2024, is soliciting presentations of papers using data from one or more LMICs, particularly from longitudinal HRS family studies such as those in Brazil (ELSI), China (CHARLS), Costa Rica (CRELES), Korea (KLoSA), India (LASI), Mexico (MHAS), and South Africa (HAALSI). It also welcomes papers using other LMIC micro-data as well as comparisons with data from high-income countries such as the US (HRS), Japan (JSTAR), England (ELSA), and Europe (SHARE).

Submit your one-page abstracts by November 1, 2023 to ceda@berkeley.edu. For more information, please see here.

We are pleased to announce the launch of the Long-Term Care (LTC) Policy Series. The LTC Series captures historical public care policies in 7 counties and 5 U.S. states and allows users to compare across policy, country or state, and time. The included countries are Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Japan, England, and the United States. The included U.S. states are California, Florida, Michigan, New York, and Texas.

These policies are available for download on our Long-Term Care Policies page.

We are pleased to announce a major update to the Harmonized HRS data. Version D includes Wave 15, conducted from March 2020 to May 2021, and a number of new variables, including positive and negative affect items and domain-specific satisfaction.

The dataset is available for download from the HRS website.

We are pleased to announce an update to the Physical and Anthropometric Measurement User Guide. This guide provides a resource for comparing height, weight, blood pressure, grip strength, and other measurements that are collected across studies in the International Network of Health and Retirement Studies.

The user guide is available for download on our User Guides page.

We are pleased to announce the release of the Retirement Policy Series for Belgium and Ireland. The Retirement Series captures historical retirement policies and allows users to compare across policy, country, and time.

These policies are available for download on our Retirement Policies page.

Monday, July 31 at 9:15 AM LA / 12:15 PM NY

The Gateway to Global Aging Data is hosting our first Research Hackathon from July 31 to August 3. This four-day team-based event is intended for early-career investigators who are focused on finding and sharing insights from large, rich, and complex aging data around the world. This webinar will be a livestream of the morning presentations given by the Hackathon’s coaches on July 31 to kick off the Hackathon. Join our webinar to learn more about cognitive aging and the Harmonized Cognitive Assessment of Dementia, considerations for cross-country analyses of cognitive data, and best methodological practices for studying cognitive aging.

Register here.

We are pleased to announce a major update to the Harmonized HRS COVID data. Version B includes the Perspectives on the Pandemic Mail Survey, conducted from May 2021 to June 2022, and a number of new variables, including antibody test results and long-term health problems.

The dataset is available for download from the HRS website.

We are pleased to announce a major update to the Harmonized SHARE COVID data. Version B includes Round 2 of the SHARE Corona Survey, conducted from June to August 2023, and a number of new variables, including self-reported health and social contact.

The dataset can be created using the Harmonized SHARE COVID Creation Code.

We are pleased to announce the release of the Harmonized version of the 2018 Harmonized Cognitive Assessment Protocol (HCAP) sub-study of ELSA. Version A maintains comparability with other Harmonized HCAP datasets and includes imputations for cognition and informant report variables.

The dataset is available for download from the UK Data Service.

We are pleased to announce a major update to the Harmonized KLoSA data. Version E includes Wave 8, conducted in 2020, and adds new variables related to healthcare and household characteristics.

The dataset can be created using the Harmonized KLoSA Creation Code.

We are pleased to announce a major update to Harmonized KLoSA End of Life data. Version B includes Wave 8, conducted in 2020.

The dataset can be created using the Harmonized KLoSA End of Life Creation Code.

We are pleased to announce the release of the Harmonized version of the 2016 Cognitive Aging Ancillary Study (Mex-Cog) sub-study of MHAS. Version A includes imputations for cognition and informant report variables.

The dataset is available for download from the MHAS website.

We are pleased to announce an update to the Harmonized LASI data. Version A.3 includes data from Sikkim state that was collected in 2020-2021.

The dataset is available for download from the Gateway to Global Aging Data.

We are pleased to announce an update to the LASI Wave 1 data. Version B includes data from Sikkim state that was collected in 2020-2021.

The dataset is available for download from the Gateway to Global Aging Data.

Thursday, May 25 at 8:00am LA / 11:00am NY / 4:00pm London

This webinar offers an introduction to the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) and to the Gateway to Global Aging Data. It will cover ELSA's sampling framework, data collection, linkages to administrative data, and distributed datasets. This webinar will also highlight the harmonized versions of the ELSA data, including the Harmonized ELSA, Harmonized ELSA Life History, and Harmonized ELSA End of Life datasets. Finally, this webinar will include a brief demonstration of a research analysis using the Harmonized ELSA dataset in Stata. This example analysis will be helpful for researchers looking to conduct research using the international family of Health and Retirement surveys and using the ELSA in particular.

Register here.

Thursday, April 27 at 8:00 AM LA /11:00 AM NY / 3:00 PM London / 8:30 PM New Delhi

This webinar will introduce researchers to the Harmonized Longitudinal Aging Study in India data family which includes user-friendly versions of LASI, LASI-DAD, and LASI COVID data. LASI is the newest study in the international family of Health and Retirement Studies and it includes a population representative sample of individuals living in India aged 45 and older. LASI-DAD is an in-depth study of cognitive aging and dementia for a sub-sample of LASI. LASI COVID is a bi-monthly phone survey of LASI-DAD households that collected information during the COVID-19 pandemic. Join our webinar to learn more about what's contained in the LASI data family, how these research-ready variables are constructed, and how to get started using these user-friendly and easily accessible datasets, including an example analysis.

Register here.

We are pleased to announce the release of the Harmonized version of the 2014 CHARLS Life History Survey.

The dataset is available for download from the CHARLS website.

We are pleased to announce the release of the Harmonized version of the 2013 CHARLS Exit Interview.

The dataset is available for download from the CHARLS website.