Social support network, social support, self-efficacy, health-promoting behavior and healthy aging among older adults: A pathway analysis

Aims: To determine the pattern of relationships among social support network, social support, self-efficacy, health-promoting behavior and healthy aging in older adults. Methods: Totally, 485 community-dwelling participants aged 60 years and older were recruited from four districts of Beijing, China. Data were obtained from July to November, 2017 using a questionnaire containing general information items, the Lubben Social Network Scale-18, the Medical Outcomes Study Social Support Survey-Chinese version, the Self-rated Abilities for Health Practices Scale, the Health-Promoting Lifestyle Profile II and a Healthy Aging Instrument. Path analysis was applied to examine the pattern of relationships between one's social support network and healthy aging. Results: The influence of a neighbor network on healthy aging was stronger than that of a family and friend network. Friend network had greater impact than family network on health-promoting behavior and self-efficacy. However, support from family members had a stronger effect than friend support and neighbor support on health-promoting behavior, self-efficacy and healthy aging. Furthermore, the finding revealed that self-efficacy had the stronger effect on healthy aging than that of health-promoting behavior. Conclusion: These findings demonstrate that one's social support network plays an important role in promoting healthy aging. In China, medical and human resources for community healthcare systems are often limited. We propose that community nurses, as the "gatekeepers" to the healthcare system, should actively collaborate with older adults' social network resources to promote healthy aging. Moreover, nurses should develop efficient programs which focus on the ways of improving self-efficacy.