ArticleThe journals of gerontology. Series B, Psychological sciences and social sciences2023
A Time of Healing: Can Social Engagement After Bereavement Reduce Trajectories of Depression After the Death of a Child?
Article in The journals of gerontology. Series B, Psychological sciences and social sciences, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 10 citations in OpenAlex.
- Trajectories of Social Activity Engagement and Physical and Cognitive Function During the Last Years of Life.Journal of the American Geriatrics Society · 2026Article
- Bereavement due to child loss, divorce, and depressive mood in older age across European welfare regimes.SSM - population health · 2024Article
- Does Helping Others Always Benefit Health? Longitudinal Evidence on the Relationship between Helping Behavior and Depression: The Mediating Role of Life Satisfaction and the Moderating Effect of IADL.Depression and anxiety · 2024Article
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Authors and funding
2 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesWe work from a stress and life-course perspective to examine the mental health of parents who experienced the death of their child. We examine whether mental health eventually returns to pre-bereavement levels and how social engagement after bereavement may shape the recovery process of depressive symptoms.
methodsWe analyze discontinuous growth curve models to assess the association between a child's death and trajectories of parents' depressive symptoms from the 1998-2016 Health and Retirement Study. The sample includes 16,182 parents aged 50 years and older.
resultsThose who transitioned to bereavement experienced an elevation in depressive symptoms and a relatively long recovery time (e.g., 7 years) to their pre-bereavement mental health in our findings. However, when engaging in volunteer work after their loss, depressive symptoms reduce more quickly to their pre-bereavement levels. Volunteering offsets up to 3 years of the negative consequences of child loss. DISCUSSION: The death of a child is a traumatic event with extensive health consequences, but research should more fully examine the dynamic nature and potential mitigation of these health consequences over time. Our findings expand the temporal lens to encompass healing processes after bereavement, incorporating the importance of social engagement.
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