Tracking Trajectories
Historical Change in Trajectories of Loneliness in Old Age : Older Adults Today are Less Lonely, But Do Not Differ in Their Age Trajectories View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Bianca Suanet
In the public debate, it has been argued that there is a "loneliness epidemic" in Western societies. We thus investigated trajectories of loneliness and examined whether current cohorts of older adults indeed report higher levels and steeper age-related increases in loneliness than earlier-born peers. Towards that end, we combined loneliness data from independent samples recruited in 1990 and 2010 to age-match 1,068 longitudinal observations from n=257 participants in the Berlin Aging Study (BASE) and n=383 participants in Berlin Aging Study II (BASE-II). We use items selected from the UCLA loneliness scales, matched cohorts on an observation-by-observation basis, estimated multilevel models that orthogonalize between-person and within-person age effects, and also examined the role of possible explanatory factors. Results reveal that at age 79, the later-born BASE-II cohort reported substantially lower levels of loneliness than the earlier-born BASE cohort (d = –0.84), with the cohort variable explaining more than 12% of the variance. Age trajectories, however, were in parallel with no evidence of cohort differences in rates of within-person age-related change. We also found that differences in gender, education, cognitive functioning, and external control beliefs accounted for the lion’s share of cohort-related differences in levels of loneliness. To illustrate, the historical reductions in levels of loneliness for the later-born cohort are basically cut in half for those who perceive higher levels of external control. Loneliness among older adults has shifted to markedly lower levels today, but the rate at which loneliness increases with age proceeds similarly as it did two decades ago.
How Active Aging Policies Addressing Health and Care Changed during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Results from a Systematic Review of National and Regional Policies in Italy View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Francesco Barbabella, Andrea Principi, Giovanni Lamura, Valerio Intraligi, Marco Socci, Davide Lucantoni
Active aging concerns the optimisation of opportunities for health, social participation and security of people as they age. It is a multidimensional concept including a wide range of activities (e.g. labor market participation, volunteering, social relations, education, leisure, healthy lifestyles) that contribute to individual well-being for all aging individuals. Limited research exists on understanding, from a multilevel perspective, how active aging policies are designed for each domain and how they evolved in recent years. Particularly, the COVID-19 pandemic posed a great challenge for the health and care sector of all countries worldwide. This study identifies what the national and regional active aging policies focused on health and care in Italy were, and whether the pandemic impacted them. Within the scope of a broader national research project, we conducted a systematic review of national and regional policies in two waves (2019 and 2021) by means of 86 interviews and document search covering 14 national administrations and 21 regional governments. An inductive thematic analysis was carried out in order to review, select and compare themes from selected policies. The analysis identified three similar themes at national and regional level (health promotion and disease prevention, health monitoring, and informal caregivers). Two additional themes were found at the regional level (access to health and social care services, and mental health and well-being). The findings indicate that the pandemic impacted the agenda setting and stimulated some evolution of policy making on active aging in Italy.
