ArticleFrontiers in psychiatry2024
Association between internet use and depression among the middle-aged and elderly adults with multimorbidity in China: do gender differences exist?
Article in Frontiers in psychiatry, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
5 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Association between digital smart device use and depression among older adults: systematic review and meta-analysis.BMC public health · 2026Pooled it
- Longitudinal trajectories of internet use, attitudes toward aging, and depression: a latent growth mediation model.Frontiers in public health · 2026Article
- Physical Activity Volume, Exercise Guidance, and Depressive Symptoms in Young-Old Adults: The Role of Internet Use Frequency and Self-Perceived Digital Proficiency.Depression and anxiety · 2026Article
- Digitization and Active Aging: How Digital Finance Shapes the Mental Health of Empty-Nest Older Individuals.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Childhood Parental Emotions and Depression Among Middle-Aged and Elderly Chinese: The Mediating Role of Adverse Childhood School Neighborhood Friendship Experiences.Depression and anxiety · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Objectives: Internet use and the results of mental health are related. Numbers of studies presented the association between Internet use and depression, and the middle-aged and elderly adults with multimorbidity are of concern. The study aimed to explore the relationship between Internet use and depression in middle-aged and elderly adults with multimorbidity. Methods: We selected 2550 respondents aged 45 years and above with multimorbidity from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS) 2018 database. Logistic regression models were constructed to examine the effects of Internet use on depression, as well as comparing gender differences. Meanwhile, propensity score matching (PSM) was used to test the robustness of the results. Results: Overall, 49.8% of respondents had a risk of developing depression, and 14.9% of the participants used the Internet. Internet use ( Conclusions: There is a significantly negative association between Internet use and depression in the middle-aged and elderly adults with multimorbidity in China, and this relationship varies across different genders. This suggests that Internet use may be a protective factor for depressive symptoms in the older population, offering a guideline for policymakers to develop specific strategies for different genders.
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