Vyncke Veerle, Hardyns Wim, Peersman Wim, Pauwels Lieven, Groenewegen Peter, Willems Sara
Department of Family Medicine and Primary Health Care, Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium.
BMC Public Health. 2014 Sep 16;14:960. doi: 10.1186/1471-2458-14-960.
Social capital has been related to various aspects of health. While literature suggests that men and women differently access and mobilize social capital, gender has received little attention within social capital research. This study examines whether the association between individual social capital and psychological distress is different for men and women.
We made use of data from a representative sample of 1025 adults within 50 neighbourhoods of Ghent (Belgium), collected in the context of the cross-sectional Social capital and Well-being In Neighbourhoods in Ghent (SWING) Survey 2011. Six components of social capital were discerned: generalized trust, social support, social influence, social engagement and attachment, the volume of social capital and the mean occupational prestige in one's network. Multilevel linear regression models were fitted to explore interactions between gender and these components of social capital.
In accordance with previous research, men report lower levels of psychological distress than women (t = 4.40, p < 0.001). Regarding the gender gap in social capital, the findings are mixed. Only for half of the social capital variables (social support, social influence and volume of social capital), a significant gender difference is found, favouring men (t = 4.03, p < 0.001; t = 1.99, p < 0.001 and t = 4.50, p < 0.001 respectively). None of the analysed interaction terms between gender and social capital is significantly related to psychological distress.
The analyses indicate that the association between individual social capital and psychological distress is similar for men and women. The relatively low level of gender stratification in Belgium might have influenced this finding. Furthermore, it is possible that social capital is not of greater importance for women in general, but mainly for women who are in an especially vulnerable social situation that deprives their access to alternative resources (e.g. unemployed women, single mothers). Future studies should seek to identify subgroups for whom social capital might be particularly influential, by transcending 'simple' dyads such as 'men versus women'.
社会资本与健康的各个方面相关。虽然文献表明男性和女性获取和利用社会资本的方式不同，但在社会资本研究中，性别因素很少受到关注。本研究考察了个体社会资本与心理困扰之间的关联在男性和女性中是否存在差异。
我们利用了来自比利时根特50个社区的1025名成年人的代表性样本数据，这些数据是在2011年根特社区社会资本与幸福感横断面调查（SWING）的背景下收集的。辨别出社会资本的六个组成部分：普遍信任、社会支持、社会影响、社会参与和依恋、社会资本的数量以及个人网络中的平均职业声望。采用多水平线性回归模型来探究性别与这些社会资本组成部分之间的相互作用。
与先前的研究一致，男性报告的心理困扰水平低于女性（t = 4.40，p < 0.001）。关于社会资本方面的性别差异，研究结果喜忧参半。仅在一半的社会资本变量（社会支持、社会影响和社会资本数量）上发现了显著的性别差异，男性占优势（分别为t = 4.03，p < 0.001；t = 1.99，p < 0.001和t = 4.50，p < 0.001）。性别与社会资本之间的所有分析交互项均与心理困扰无显著关联。
分析表明，个体社会资本与心理困扰之间的关联在男性和女性中相似。比利时相对较低的性别分层水平可能影响了这一发现。此外，有可能社会资本对一般女性而言并非更重要，而是主要对处于特别弱势社会状况、无法获取替代资源的女性（如失业女性、单身母亲）更重要。未来的研究应超越“男性对女性”这样的“简单”二元组，试图确定社会资本可能具有特别影响力的亚组。
