ArticleBMC psychology2026
Heterogeneous and nonlinear associations between depressive symptoms and functional disability in older Chinese adults.
Article in BMC psychology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
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.
The trial behind it
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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundExisting studies on the association between depressive symptoms and functional disability in older adults have mainly focused on average effects. However, limited evidence is available on how this association varies across different levels of disability, and the potential nonlinear relationship between the two remains unclear.
methodsThis study used data from the 2015, 2018, and 2020 waves of the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS). A balanced panel of 1,189 older adults with disability was constructed. A two-way fixed-effects model was used to estimate the association between depressive symptoms and functional disability. Quantile regression (QR)was employed to examine heterogeneity across different quantiles of disability. Quantile random forest (QRF)was further used to explore the nonlinear relationship between depressive symptoms and functional disability.
resultsDepressive symptoms were significantly positively associated with functional disability (β = 0.171, p < 0.001). QR analyses showed that this association differed substantially across quantiles of disability and increased progressively from lower to higher quantiles (from 0.034 to 0.267). QRF analysis further revealed the effect became markedly stronger at higher levels of depressive symptoms. SHAP analysis at the individual level further supported these findings.
conclusionDepressive symptoms are an important factor affecting functional disability in older adults. Their effect shows significant distributional heterogeneity and nonlinear characteristics. Strengthening depression intervention among older adults with higher levels of disability may help delay the progression of functional decline.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.