Loneliness in older parents: marital transitions, family and social connections, and separate bedrooms for sleep

Chi Chiao · Wen‐Hsu Lin · Yu-Hua Chen · Chin-Chun Yi

13 citations0/0 files storedBMC Geriatrics

No readable copy stored yet — this record is metadata only.

No open-access location is known for this record yet.

Literature note Cite in a project Citation map

Health disparities and outcomes Attachment and Relationship Dynamics Aging, Health, and Disability

Abstract

OBJECTIVES: This research innovatively analyzed the marital transitions (i.e., divorce and widowhood) of older Taiwanese parents, their sleep problems and spousal specific characteristics (i.e., separate bedrooms for sleep and marital relationships) as well as their social and family connections, all of which were simultaneously reflected in emotional and social domains of loneliness. METHODS: Data are from 1645 older parents from Northern Taiwan. Loneliness was assessed by a De Jong-Gierveld short scale with emotional and social domains. We conducted multivariate logistic regression to examine the associations of marital transitions and family/social connections regarding sleep problems and psychological well-being with loneliness in social and emotional domains. Besides sleep problems and individual socioeconomic status, we included data on couples' sleeping arrangements and marital relationships. RESULTS: Social loneliness was significantly associated with being divorced (AOR = 1.80, 95% CI 1.13-2.86) and living alone (AOR = 1.50, 95% CI 1.02-2.23). In contrast, strong family cohesion and frequent weekly contact with friends were associated with lower social loneliness. Married parents who slept in separate bedrooms were more likely than bed-sharing couples to feel emotional and social loneliness, despite adjusting for their sleep problems. Furthermore, satisfactory spousal relationships significantly decreased the magnitude of associations in the social domain. DISCUSSION: Our findings support significant associations between loneliness in later life and major marital transitions, family and social connections and sleep problems which differ in social and emotional domains. Independent of relationship satisfaction, separate bedrooms relate to higher risks of emotional loneliness in older adults.

Paper brief

Loading…

Cite this work

Citation unavailable for this work.

BibTeX RIS CSL-JSON

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Citations in this library

Citation map →

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 13 citations exist upstream.

References

1989The Pittsburgh sleep quality index: A new instrument for psychiatric practice and research 2015Loneliness and Social Isolation as Risk Factors for Mortality 2016Loneliness and social isolation as risk factors for coronary heart disease and stroke: systematic review and meta-analysis of longitudinal observational studies 2006A 6-Item Scale for Overall, Emotional, and Social Loneliness 2005Psychometric Evaluation of the Chinese Version of the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (CPSQI) in Primary Insomnia and Control Subjects 2020Sleep disturbance and psychiatric disorders 2010The De Jong Gierveld short scales for emotional and social loneliness: tested on data from 7 countries in the UN generations and gender surveys 2012Sleep Problems: An Emerging Global Epidemic? Findings From the INDEPTH WHO-SAGE Study Among More Than 40,000 Older Adults From 8 Countries Across Africa and Asia

Explore the map →

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.

Imported from OpenAlex (CC0) — nothing here is generated.