Perceived social support and relationship quality predict loneliness in older adults: a social network approach

ObjectivesLoneliness negatively impacts older adults' mental and physical health. Though loneliness is associated with perceived social support, its relationship to received support is unclear. This might be because received support has been defined sparsely, overlooking types of support and overall relationship quality. The current study addressed this gap.MethodOlder adults recruited from the community (N = 142) and the Indiana Alzheimer's Disease Research Center (ADRC) (N = 176) completed an expanded PhenX social network interview to identify social network size, types of received support (emotional, instrumental), and relationship quality (network closeness, contact frequency). They also completed well-validated measures of loneliness and perceived social support. Data were analyzed with hierarchical linear regressions.ResultsIn both samples, loneliness was negatively related to perceived social support but was not related to either received support type. Contact frequency predicted loneliness in both samples, but network closeness predicted loneliness in the ADRC sample only. Dementia status did not affect results.ConclusionSocial network size, emotional received support, and instrumental received support were not related to loneliness, but perceived social support and relationship quality were. These findings suggest that loneliness is influenced by perceived social support and some types of received support.