Emotional and instrumental social support and older adults’ depressive symptoms: collaborative individual participant data meta-analysis of 11 population-based studies of aging - Summary - MDSpire

Emotional and instrumental social support and older adults’ depressive symptoms: collaborative individual participant data meta-analysis of 11 population-based studies of aging

  • By

  • Suraj Samtani

  • Gowsaly Mahalingam

  • Ben C P Lam

  • Darren M Lipnicki

  • Katya Numbers

  • Maria Fernanda Lima-Costa

  • Sergio Luis Blay

  • Erico Castro Costa

  • Shifu Xiao

  • Steffi Reidel-Heller

  • Susanne Röhr

  • Alexander Pabst

  • Nikolaos Scarmeas

  • Mary Yannakoulia

  • Mary Kosmidis

  • Murali Krishna

  • Kalyanaraman Kumaran

  • Suzana Shahar

  • Tze Pin Ng

  • Roger Ho

  • Ki-Woong Kim

  • Ingmar Skoog

  • Jenna Najar

  • Therese Rydberg Sterner

  • Mary Ganguli

  • Chung-Chou Ho Chang

  • Tiffany F Hughes

  • Perminder S Sachdev

  • Henry Brodaty

  • For the Cohort Studies of Memory in an International Consortium (COSMIC)

  • July 10, 2025

  • 0 min

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Objective:

To clarify the association between emotional and instrumental social support and depressive symptoms in older adults, examining both cross-sectional and longitudinal perspectives.

Key Findings:
  • Emotional support was associated with lower depressive symptoms both cross-sectionally (B = -0.40 [95% CI, -0.60 to -0.21]) and longitudinally (B = -0.37 [95% CI, -0.54 to -0.20]).
  • Instrumental support was not significantly associated with depressive symptoms cross-sectionally (B = 0.17 [95% CI, -0.26 to 0.59]) or longitudinally (B = 0.09 [95% CI, -0.30 to 0.49]).
Interpretation:

Emotional support plays a crucial role in reducing depressive symptoms in older adults, while instrumental support does not show a significant association with depressive symptoms.

Limitations:
  • The study may not fully account for cultural differences in social support perceptions, which could influence the results.
  • Variability in measures of social support and depression across studies could affect results.
Conclusion:

Findings suggest that interventions aimed at enhancing emotional support may be effective in preventing and reducing depression among older adults.

Original Source(s)

Emotional and instrumental social support and older adults’ depressive symptoms: collaborative individual participant data meta-analysis of 11 population-based studies of aging

  • by Suraj Samtani, Gowsaly Mahalingam, Ben C P Lam, Darren M Lipnicki, Katya Numbers, Maria Fernanda Lima-Costa, Sergio Luis Blay, Erico Castro Costa, Shifu Xiao, Steffi Reidel-Heller, Susanne Röhr, Alexander Pabst, Nikolaos Scarmeas, Mary Yannakoulia, Mary Kosmidis, Murali Krishna, Kalyanaraman Kumaran, Suzana Shahar, Tze Pin Ng, Roger Ho, Ki-Woong Kim, Ingmar Skoog, Jenna Najar, Therese Rydberg Sterner, Mary Ganguli, Chung-Chou Ho Chang, Tiffany F Hughes, Perminder S Sachdev, Henry Brodaty, For the Cohort Studies of Memory in an International Consortium (COSMIC)

  • July 10, 2025

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