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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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Marriage, social integration and loneliness in the second half of life
— a comparison of Dutch and German men and women | | Author(s) | Nan Stevens, Gerben J Westerhof |
| Journal title | Research on Aging, vol 28, no 6, November 2006 |
| Pages | pp 713-729 |
| Keywords | Marriage ; Integration ; Loneliness ; Comparison ; Netherlands ; Germany. |
| Annotation | Although marriage is usually considered to be socially integrative, some studies indicate that it can be overly private, enclosing couples in isolated dyads. This study compared the availability of support, companionship and negative relational experiences in various types of relationships for married men and women aged 40-85 in the Netherlands and Germany. The Dutch demonstrated a more varied pattern of relationships beyond the nuclear family than the Germans but also reported worrying about a greater variety of people. In both countries, men relied more strongly on their partners, whereas women had more varied networks and experienced more worries. A continuum of social involvement can be drawn with German men, for whom marriage is privacy inducing at one end, and Dutch women, for whom marriage is highly socially integrating at the other. Loneliness was related to the provision of social relations, but no national and gender differences in predictors of loneliness were found. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-070115216 A |
| Classmark | SL: TO: DV: 48: 76H: 767 |
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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