Abstract: With the aging of Chinese society， the health problems of the elderly pose a great challenge to the country’s economic and social development. Death risk in the elderly is influenced by a combination of physical， psychological and social factors. Based on Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey （CLHLS） and Cox proportional hazard model， the relationship between and the mechanism（direct， alternative， indirect and selective） of media use and death risk in the elderly is examined. It is found that print media use （reading books， reading newspapers， etc.） and electronic media use （watching television， listening radio， etc.） can significantly reduce death risk in the elderly； the main mechanism of electronic media use has a direct impact on the death risk in the elderly since despite a variety of factors controlled， electronic media use can still significantly affect death risk； the main mechanism of print media use has a selective impact on the death risk which involves socioeconomic characteristics. The significant reduction in death risk from print media use occurs only in those educated elderly who live with their families and have pensions.

Key words: media use, death risk, direct mechanism, selective mechanism, Cox model