Social support network typologies and their association with dementia and depression among older adults in Singapore: a cross-sectional analysis

Abstract

ObjectivesTo examine the social support network type and its associations with depression and dementia among older adults in Singapore.DesignThis study is a cross-sectional analysis of data from the Well-being of the Singapore Elderly study. The Practitioner Assessment of Network Type was used to identify five social support network types. Odds Ratios (OR) of dementia and depression were estimated with logistic regression and multinomial logistic regression, respectively, adjusted for sociodemographic variables.SettingSingapore.Outcome measures10/66 criteria and Automated Geriatric Examination for Computer Assisted Taxonomy computer algorithm.Participants2421 older adults aged 60 years and above, and their informants.ResultsLogistic regression revealed that as compared with participants in the family dependent social support network type, those in the locally integrated social support network type were negatively associated with dementia. It was observed that it is the older adults’ perception of the quality of social interaction that influences the likelihood of depression.ConclusionThe social support network typology presents knowledge about the older adults’ social network profile and their cognitive functioning-ability which would help stakeholders better identify older adults who might be at risk of cognitive decline or experiencing delay in diagnosis of dementia.

Effects of sources of social support and resilience on the mental health of different age groups during the COVID-19 pandemic

“…Latent profile analysis, LPA) have received growing interest in the typologies of social support networks in recent years (e.g. [21,22]). What's more, although based on slightly different concepts, some researchers have used cluster analysis to study social network typologies for a long time (e.g.…”

“…[23]). More importantly, the existing papers demonstrated different support profiles would be differently associated with mental health outcomes [21,22,24]. Specifically, Burholt et al [21] adopted LPA and found that the four social support profiles differ in their relationships to wellbeing in older migrants.…”

“…The migrants with family-oriented profiles will experience lower levels of loneliness. Lau et al [22] found that as compared with participants in the family-dependent social support profile, older adults in the locally integrated social support profile were negatively associated with dementia. McConnell et al [24] adopted cluster analysis and explored how the combinations of different sources of support impact mental health among lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender youth.…”

Associations of Quality, Quantity, and Structural Characteristics of Individual Social Network on Depressive Symptoms

“…Literature has revealed a link between social networks and mental health outcomes, focusing mainly on middle-aged [3] or elderly people [4], or patients with mental illnesses such as depression [5][6][7][8], anxiety [9], psychosis [10], post-traumatic stress disorder [2,11,12], or dementia [13]. Social networks here refer individual's connections including with both family and close friends, or broader social ties within a community [14][15][16].…”

Association between social network characteristics and depressive symptoms in South Korean adults: The moderating roles of age diversity and age difference

“…Social networks refer to the systems of social relationships in which individuals are connected to one another through different sets of interactions [4][5][6]. Abundant research has reported a link between social networks and mental health outcomes in both positive and negative ways [7,8], in middle-aged [9] or elderly people [10], in Western [11][12][13] or non-Western background [6,14,15], or patients with mental illnesses such as depression [3,[16][17][18], anxiety [19], psychosis [20], post-traumatic stress disorder [8,21,22], or dementia [14]. Some researchers have proposed that an inadequacy of social network quality or quantity may lead to loneliness, which is related to an elevated risk of depression or psychiatric symptoms [16,23,24].…”