ArticleBMC geriatrics2020
Differentiating objective and subjective dimensions of social isolation and apprasing their relations with physical and mental health in italian older adults.
Article in BMC geriatrics, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 34 citations in OpenAlex.
- Trial
- Assessing the association of physical distancing to avoid COVID-19 with health-related quality of life in immunocompromised adults: results from the cross-sectional observational EAGLE study.BMJ public health · 2026Article
- Perceived Social Isolation and Fentanyl Use Among Adults Who Inject Drugs in Rural Kentucky.Social work in public health · 2025Article
- Monitoring utilisation patterns of home- and community-based services for healthy ageing: a cross-sectional study.BMC geriatrics · 2025Article
- Gender Differences in Objective and Subjective Social Isolation and Self-Reported Hypertension in Older Adults.Journal of cardiovascular development and disease · 2025Article
- Unshared Minds, Decaying Worlds: Towards a Pathology of Chronic Loneliness.The Journal of medicine and philosophy · 2024Article
- A Systematic Review of the Relationship between Social Isolation and Physical Health in Adults.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Review
- The role of frailty in the relationships between social relationships and health outcomes: a longitudinal study.BMC public health · 2024Article
- Social context as a source of variability in the psychological sciences.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2024Article
- A brief but comprehensive three-item social connectedness screener for use in social risk assessment tools.PloS one · 2024Article
- Are loneliness and social isolation equal threats to health and well-being? An outcome-wide longitudinal approach.SSM - population health · 2023Article
- The Risk for Loneliness and Major Depression among Solo Agers.Journal of applied gerontology : the official journal of the Southern Gerontological Society · 2023Article
- Psychometric assessment of scales for measuring loneliness and social isolation: an analysis of the household, income and labour dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey.Health and quality of life outcomes · 2022Article
- Domestic violence during the COVID-19 confinement: do victims feel more socially isolated?Archives of public health = Archives belges de sante publique · 2022Article
- Investigating the Impact of Isolation During COVID-19 on Family Functioning - An Australian Snapshot.Frontiers in psychology · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundInternational research shows that social isolation is harmful for health, especially for the elderly. Its objective and subjective dimensions are important to distinguish as each stands in a different relation with health. The first aim of the present study is the validation of three scales measuring objective and subjective isolation in an Italian elderly population. The second aim is to analyze subjective and objective social isolation and to appraise their association with health among seniors.
methodsThis cross-sectional survey collected data from 306 over 65 s participants. Questionnaires were administered face-to-face by one author and encompassed: social disconnectedness scale; perceived isolation scale; abbreviated Lubben Social Network Scale; measures of general and mental health, and depression.
resultsThe three scales measuring social isolation demonstrated acceptable psychometric properties and validity. Objective and subjective social isolation were not directly associated with physical health, whereas subjective isolation is strongly linked to worse mental health and depression. Higher level of subjective isolation was associated with lower level of physical health through the mediation of mental health. Subjective isolation served as a mediator in the relation between objective isolation and health. Moderation analysis demonstrated that low values of objective isolation predicted high values of mental health but only when subjective isolation was low. None of these relations were moderated by socio-demographic variables.
conclusionSubjective and objective isolation are clearly two separate dimensions and the scales validated in this paper showed to be potentially culturally invariant. Researchers should work to find instruments able to depict the complexity of the construct of social isolation.
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