Litwin Howard, Stoeckel Kimberly J, Schwartz Ella
Israel Gerontological Data Center, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel.
Paul Baerwald School of Social Work, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mount Scopus, 91905 Jerusalem, Israel.
Eur J Ageing. 2015 Jun 16;12(4):299-309. doi: 10.1007/s10433-015-0347-y. eCollection 2015 Dec.
This study examined different components of personal social networks-structure, interaction, and quality-and the extent to which each is related to mental health among a 65+ sample ( = 26,784) taken from the fourth wave of the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Europe. The first aim of the study was to determine which network components had the strongest associations with the number of depressive symptoms, measured on the EURO-D scale. Secondly, the study considered if and how age impacted the associations between social network and depression, using interaction terms that paired age category (age 65-79; age 80+) with the score on each network component. Hierarchical OLS regressions revealed that social network quality and network structure were both negatively related to the number of depressive symptoms. The association between network size (structure) and depression was even greater among those 80+. Age differences were also found for network interaction. More frequent contact with the network was related to a greater extent of depressive symptoms, but only among respondents aged 80 and older. Closer geographic proximity was related to having fewer depressive symptoms, but only among respondents aged 65-79. The findings imply that the association between meaningful personal relationships and depression in late life is nuanced by both network characteristics and by age.
本研究考察了个人社交网络的不同组成部分——结构、互动和质量——以及在取自欧洲健康、老龄化和退休调查第四波的65岁及以上样本（n = 26,784）中，每一部分与心理健康的关联程度。该研究的首要目标是确定哪些网络组成部分与用欧洲抑郁量表（EURO-D）测量的抑郁症状数量具有最强的关联。其次，该研究通过将年龄类别（65 - 79岁；80岁及以上）与每个网络组成部分的得分配对的交互项，来考量年龄是否以及如何影响社交网络与抑郁之间的关联。分层OLS回归显示，社交网络质量和网络结构均与抑郁症状数量呈负相关。在80岁及以上人群中，网络规模（结构）与抑郁之间的关联甚至更强。在网络互动方面也发现了年龄差异。与社交网络更频繁的接触在更大程度上与抑郁症状相关，但仅在80岁及以上的受访者中如此。地理距离更近与抑郁症状较少相关，但仅在65 - 79岁的受访者中如此。研究结果表明，有意义的个人关系与晚年抑郁之间的关联因网络特征和年龄而变得微妙。
