Social Networks, Perceived Social Support, and Depressive Symptoms Among Older Adults

Background and Purpose:

Many studies have documented the beneficial effect of social support on levels of depressive symptoms among older adults.  While many studies have recently examined the role of social ties on depressive symptoms, a few studies have conducted to examine how social ties were associated with perceived social support that is related to depression.  The purpose of the study is to examine the mediation role of perceived social support in relationships between a set of social network characteristics and depressive symptoms. 

Methods:

The present study utilized 2,985 old adults from the National Social Life, Health and Aging Project (NSLHA) (2005-2006).  To assess the role of social network characteristics, the NSLHA asked respondents listed their social relationships during the past 12 months.  This study utilized the following social network characteristics: compositional variables such as types of relation (e.g., family, friends), frequencies of contacts (e.g., weekly), having health related discussion and structural variables such as bridge and density.  Perceived social support was assessed by mean scores of six items asking emotional support (e.g., relying on or opening up) from spouse, family, and friends.  Depressive symptoms were measured by the 11-item Center for the Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CESD-11).  In addition, this study included covariates such as age, education, ethnicity, and levels of ADL difficulties.

The present study conducted a series of multiple regressions to examine the mediation role of perceived social support in a relationship between social network characteristics and depressive symptoms.  All analyses were conducted using SAS 9.4 to account for complex survey design.   

Results:

The majority of the sample (80.7%) was non-Hispanic Whites, with a mean age of 68.0 (SD=7.9).  Approximately one fourth of respondents reported having a spouse or a romantic partner (73.1%) and lower than high school graduation (76%).  The mean number of ADL difficulties was 6.16 (SD=0.7).  The mean scores of depressive symptoms were 4.55 (SD=4.12). 

The present study found the indirect effects of two personal network variables on levels of depressive symptoms via perceived social support.  Having a partner and having persons who had health related discussion were associated with higher levels of perceived social support, which in turn lowering depressive symptoms.  In addition, other social network variables such as greater number of family members was associated with the lower levels of depressive symptoms (main effects).

Conclusion and Implications:

The findings highlight the mediation role of perceived social support in the relationship between social network characteristics and levels of depressive symptoms.  This study also highlight that it is important to help older adults build social ties that have more health related discussion, which may decrease levels of depressive symptoms among older adults.  Further study is need to examine the longitudinal association between social network variables and levels of depressive symptoms via perceived social support.