Relationship between social support and life satisfaction among the rural elderly: Mediating effect and moderating effect / 中国心理卫生杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective:To investigate the relationship between social support and life satisfaction among the rural elderly,and to explore the moderating and mediating variable between them.Methods:Totally 768 rural elders [aged 60-96 years,average age (70 ±7) years] from Beijing,Hubei and Anhui Province were measured with selfmade General Questionnaire (including self-reported health,rated by five grades from very poor,poor,common,good to very good),self-made Social Support Scale for the Elderly,University of California Los Angeles Loneliness Scale-6 (ULS-6) and Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS).Results:Loneliness partly mediated the relationship between social support and life satisfaction and the value of mediating effect was 56.3％.The effect of social support on the rural elders'life satisfaction was moderated by self-evaluated health.Post-hoc analysis indicted that only when the scores of self-evaluated health were lower,social support could predict life satisfaction at a significant level (β =0.25,P ＜0.001).When the scores of self-evaluated health were higher,the predicting effect was not significant (β=0.04,P ＞ 0.05).Conclusion:The relationship between social support and life satisfaction of the rural elderly is mediated by loneliness and moderated by self-evaluated health.