Depression mediates the effect of character strengths on subjective wellbeing of the elderly

Abstract

Background: With evidence of a rapidly aging population globally, there is need to continuously address the wellbeing of this vulnerable age group. The concern of the subjective wellbeing of the elderly is essential for constructing a healthy and positive aging society. To promote the elderly’s subjective wellbeing, the role of character strengths and depression on subjective wellbeing for older adults needs to be explored. Methods: A large sample of 8839 elders from the 2017-2018 survey of the Chinese Longitudinal Healthy Longevity Survey (CLHLS) were included. The Chinese version of the character strengths scale, the 10-item CES-D scale (Center for Epidemiologic Studies Short Depression Scale) were applied to assess the elderly‘s character strengths and depression respectively. Self-reported quality of life (SelfQoL) and health (Selfhealth) were used to evaluate the subjective wellbeing in participants. IBM SPSS Statistics 25.0 and AMOS version 23.0 were adopted to analyze the data.Results: The average age of participants was 81.27 years. Among these elderly participants, a greater character strengths levels were more evidenced and pronounced among those with a younger age, longer years of education, higher household income, greater social security and social insurance, less depression, higher SelfQoL and Selfhealth levels. Depression had a partial mediation effect of character strengths on self-reported subjective wellbeing, which explained a 36% in total variance (R2=0.36). In addition, character strengths had a statistically significant positive and direct effect on subjective wellbeing (β= 0.290, P<0.001). Furthermore, the indirect effect of character strengths to subjective wellbeing was: β=(-0.603)*(-0.378)=0.228. Conclusion: Depression is an unignored mediator that regulates the effect of character strengths on subjective wellbeing in the elderly. Character strengths and depression may be the new intervention targets to promote and enhance the elderly's subjective wellbeing. Future tailored intervention should focus on relieving the elderly's depression and promoting the development of their character strengths.