Relation between social network and psychological distress among middle-aged adults in Japan: Evidence from a national longitudinal survey

Abstract

It is widely documented that psychological distress is negatively associated with social networks involvement. However, despite the theoretical postulations that social networks are crucial for alleviating psychological distress, no study has yet empirically confirmed the causality of this relationship. Thus, we used the random-effects generalized least squares method to investigate the effect of one- and two-year lagged values for involvement in social networks on psychological distress. Nine years of longitudinal data were extracted from a nationally representative survey in Japan ("The Longitudinal Survey of Middle-aged and Older Persons"). We utilized the Kessler 6 (K6) score to measure psychological distress among 15,242 respondents aged 50-59 years in the baseline year (2005), and stratified participants into three layers of social networks: inner (well-established friendship ties and participating in hobby activates), intermediary (neighborly ties), and outer (involvement in community activities). We found highly significant and negative associations between all three layers and K6 scores, with the strongest association being for the inner layer. We further observed that one-year lagged involvement in the inner and intermediary layers led to significantly lower K6 scores. However, the protective influences of social networks generally diminished over time. In addition, the protective influences of social network involvement on psychological distress were stronger for women than for men. Furthermore, involvement in social networks was especially important for improving mental health among people with psychological distress. These findings would be important for policymaking to prevent mental health deterioration among middle-aged adults in Japan.

Impact of social participation on health among middle-aged and elderly adults: evidence from longitudinal survey data in China

“…Both the descriptive and regression analyses showed that the engagement in SP had a positive impact on health outcomes in later waves. These results were generally in line with those in previous studies that dealt with related issues in China [21][22][23] as well as outside the country [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14]27].…”

“…Among others, four findings are noteworthy. First, the positive impact of SP was remarkable for mental health as well as ADL, a result consistent with the findings in the previous studies in the developed countries [6][7][8][9][10][11]. The number of patients with mental health disorder has been increasing in China in recent years.…”

“…For both BADL and IADL, the respondents' responses were scored as: I don't have any difficulty = 4, I have difficulty but can still do it = 3, I have difficulty and need help = 2, I cannot do it = 1. The scores were summed up and defined as BADL (range: 6-24) and IADL (5)(6)(7)(8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20). The Chronbach's α was 0.…”

“…Social participation (SP) is known to have a preventive impact on illness, particularly for the elderly. Several studies have demonstrated that SP experiences prevent the onset of diseases and functional disability [1][2][3][4][5], mental health disorder [6][7][8][9][10][11], cognitive impairment [3,7,12], and delayed mortality [13,14] among the elderly. Interactions with others in society or a communityconsidered core aspects of SP and closely related to the concept of hedonic stock-are expected to accelerate adaptation to health shocks, as well as prevent their onsets [15].…”

Impact of social participation on health among middle-aged and elderly adults Evidence from longitudinal survey data in China

“…Several studies have demonstrated that SP experiences prevent the onset of diseases and functional disability [1][2][3][4][5], mental health disorder [7][8][9][10][11][12], cognitive impairment [3,8,13], and delayed mortality [14,15] among the elderly. Interactions with others in society or a community-considered core aspects of SP and closely related to the concept of hedonic stock-are expected to accelerate adaptation to health shocks, as well as prevent their onsets [16].…”