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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| Altruism relates to health in an ethnically diverse sample of older adults | | Author(s) | William Michael Brown, Nathan S Consedine, Carol Magai |
| Journal title | Journals of Gerontology: Series B, Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, vol 60B, no 3, May 2005 |
| Pages | pp P143-P152 |
| Source | http://www.geron.org |
| Keywords | Attitude ; Social characteristics [elderly] ; Health [elderly] ; Informal care ; Ethnic groups ; Correlation ; United States of America. |
| Annotation | The existing literature indicates links between aspects of social network functioning and health outcomes. It is generally believed that networks that are larger or provide greater instrumental and emotional support contribute to improved health and, perhaps, greater longevity. Recently, it has been suggested that giving as well as receiving social support may be of benefit. On the basis of evolutionary theories of emotion and altruism, the current study sought to test this thesis with an ethnically diverse sample of 1,118 older people living in the community in Brooklyn, New York. As expected, levels of social support given were associated with lower morbidity, whereas levels of receiving were not. It is important that these relations held even when first: socioeconomic status, education, marital status, age, gender, ethnicity; and second, absolute network size and activity limitation were controlled for. Results are discussed in terms of their implications for theory regarding the relations among social exchanges, giving, and later life adaptation among older people. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-051103218 A |
| Classmark | DP: F: CC: P6: TK: 49: 7T |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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