ArticleBMC geriatrics2021
Social engagement and physical frailty in later life: does marital status matter?
Article in BMC geriatrics, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 46 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
46 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 91 citations in OpenAlex.
- Socially-supported sleep in older adults aged 50 and older: a concept analysis.Frontiers in public health · 2024Pooled it
- Prevalence of Frailty Among Chinese Community-Dwelling Older Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.International journal of public health · 2023Pooled it
- Association of an estimated glucose disposal rate-frailty index with incident cardiovascular events in two prospective cohorts.International journal of cardiology. Cardiovascular risk and prevention · 2026Article
- Associations between sensory impairment and neuropsychiatric symptoms among older adults: a moderated mediating model.BMC public health · 2026Article
- A longitudinal study on multiple frailty and its associations with depression and social participation in older adults.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Association of sarcopenia and frailty with sleep quality trajectories in middle-aged and older Chinese adults: findings from a nationally representative cohort study.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Association between depressive symptoms and cognitive impairment among older adults in China: a mediation analysis of proactive health.BMC geriatrics · 2025Article
- Risk factors for and a prediction nomogram of physical frailty in older patients hospitalized with acute calculous cholecystitis.Global health & medicine · 2025Article
- Association between activities of daily living and depression symptoms among older adults in China: A nationally representative cross-sectional survey.BMC psychology · 2025Article
- Low Social Engagement and Risk of Death in Older Adults.Journal of the American Geriatrics Society · 2025Article
- Impact of spousal caregiving on frailty index: longitudinal evidence from China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study.Age and ageing · 2025Article
- Frailty in older adults: A systematic review of risk factors and early intervention pathways.Intractable & rare diseases research · 2025Review
- The Impact of Socioeconomic Factors on Cognitive Ability in Community-Dwelling Older Adults: Mediating Effect of Social Participation and Social Support.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- The longitudinal relationship between night-time sleep duration, midday napping, and frailty among middle-aged and older people in China: a prospective analysis.Journal of global health · 2025Article
- Effect of a home-based physical rehabilitation program via virtual reality on the functional outcomes of frail older adults: a quasi-experimental study.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Natural Language Processing and Social Determinants of Health in Mental Health Research: AI-Assisted Scoping Review.JMIR mental health · 2025Article
- Social interaction and functional status among community-dwelling older adults in Japan: a longitudinal study during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Development and validation of PRE-FRA (PREdiction of FRAilty risk in community older adults) frailty prediction model.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Anemia as a mediator: bridging the frailty index and hip fractures in older Chinese populations.Frontiers in public health · 2025Article
- Perceptions, opportunities and barriers of social engagement among the Chinese older adults: a qualitative study.BMC geriatrics · 2024Article
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundPhysical frailty is a common characteristic of older people with the ageing process and has been viewed as a major public health issue. The longitudinal association between different social engagement and physical frailty among older people has not been explored adequately in China. Marital status forms a critical context for the link between social engagement and frailty among older people, which might constitute a moderating process. The purpose of the present study is to investigate the longitudinal association between social engagement and the changes in physical frailty among Chinese older adults, and to examine whether the association between social engagement and frailty differs by marital status.
methodsThe data use in this study were from the data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study aged 60+ years from 2011 to 2015. A total of 6575 respondents who participated in at least one follow-up wave were included in the analysis. The relationship between social engagement and changes in frailty over time, and the moderating role of marital status were estimated using individual fixed-effects models. Sensitive analyses were conducted to test the robustness of the results.
resultsAfter adjusting the confounders, participants who interact with friends (Coef: -1.309, P < 0.001), engaging in hobby groups (Coef: -1.189, P < 0.001), engaging in sports groups (Coef: -0.945, P = 0.001), and volunteering (Coef: -1.957, P = 0.001) with a frequency of almost daily had a significantly lower frailty risk than participants who never engaging in those activities. The association between frequent engaging in hobby groups and physical frailty was strongest for unmarried than married older adults (Coef: -1.325, P = 0.031).
conclusionsFrequent social engagement might help to decrease the risk of frailty in the Chinese older population. This finding has important implications for public health policy and encourages the incorporation of a broad range of social engagement into the daily lives of older individuals. Specially, encouraging unmarried older adults to engage in intellectual activities, such as playing chess or Mahjong with others, may be an effective way to reduce physical frailty.
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