The Moderating Role of Family Social Capital in the Relationship between Community Social Capital and Life Satisfaction among Older Adults in Northeast Rural China

doi:10.21203/rs.3.rs-2266378/v1

Background: This study examined the moderating effect of family social capital on the relationship between community social capital and life satisfaction among rural community-dwelling older adults in Northeast China.

Methods: Data were based on a social survey in the rural communities of Northeast China in late 2019. The analytic model included 455 respondents who completed the survey successfully. We used multiple-group analysis to test the proposed hypotheses.

Results: The results show that family social capital played a significant moderating role in the relationship between community social capital and life satisfaction. In other words, both cognitive social capital and social participation were significantly associated with life satisfaction in the higher family social capital group, whereas these associations were not significant among those with relatively lower levels of family social capital.

Conclusions: The future development of social capital policies and interventions should focus on not only the promotion of cognitive social capital and social participation among rural community-dwelling older adults, but also the social needs of older rural Chinese adults with low family social capital.

community social capital

family social capital

life satisfaction

China’s population is aging rapidly. According to data from China’s seventh census in 2020, the population aged 60 or older is 264.02 million, accounting for 18.70% of the total population. Of this subpopulation, 190.64 million people are aged 65 or older, accounting for 13.50% of the total population [1]. Compared with the sixth census of 2010, the proportion of people aged 60 or older and 65 or older increased by 5.44% and 4.63%, respectively [2]. Given the rapidly growing number of older people, well-being in later life is an important goal that policy makers, intervention designers, and researchers should pursue in the next few decades.

Life satisfaction is defined as individuals’ subjective assessment of their global life and is an important indicator of quality of life [3]. For older adults, life satisfaction not only reflects their capacity to function in daily life, but also plays a key role in enhancing their social participation and promoting meaning in life. In general, factors related to life satisfaction in later life include demographic characteristics such as age, gender, educational attainment, income, socioeconomic status, and marital status, along with other health-related and living environment factors [4-11]. Empirical studies showed that both social capital formed in community-based social network and family social capital (e.g., relationships with and support from family members) play important roles in enhancing life satisfaction in later life [9, 11].

Both life satisfaction and social capital are sensitive to social, cultural, and economic contexts [12, 13]. Given that China is a typical urban–rural dualistic society, rural older adults’ socioeconomic status and access to health resources and services are more likely to be worse than those of their urban counterparts [14]. In addition, pension system and health insurance benefits in rural China are less than those in urban regions [15-17]. Under such circumstances, rural older adults are more likely to rely on their family members as the main supportive source to meet their aging care needs [18-22]. However, with the rapid modernization and urbanization in China, millions of working-age adults left rural areas to work in cities, which significantly weakened the family support system in rural areas (e.g., instrumental support) [23]. In this case, the compensatory role of community social capital in promoting the well-being of rural older adults deserves particular attention. In other words, the development of community-based social capital policies and interventions in rural China can be a cost-effective strategy to promote life satisfaction in later life in these rural communities. This study aimed to fill a research gap by testing the interplay between community social capital and family social capital and their influence on life satisfaction among older adults in rural China.

Defining community social capital

Social capital provides opportunities for older adults to enhance their interpersonal interactions and social resources that are important for them to maintain their functional integrity and social roles in later life. Although critical sources of social capital vary across the life course, community and family are considered two major sources of social capital for older adults in rural Chinese communities. There is no consensus on the concept of community social capital and family social capital in the health research field [24-26]. Regarding community social capital, Robert D. Putnam conceptualized it as “features of social organization, such as trust, norms, and networks, that can improve the efficiency of society by facilitating coordinated actions” [26]. From this collectivist perspective, community functions as a type of platform of social coordination and could promote collective interests for local residents through norms of reciprocity, a sense of belonging, and social trust. Furthermore, community social capital can be defined as important social resources based on individuals’ social networks [24]. Community social capital can be further conceptualized as cognitive and structural social capital [27]. The former refers to residents’ subjective appraisals—for example, whether they are willing to trust and help other members in the local communities, whether they frequently engage in reciprocity with their neighbors, and their feelings of belonging to the communities [28]. The latter refers to the objective measures, including the number of the residents’ organizational memberships and their participation in citizenship activities and volunteering activities [29].

Based on a systematic review, family social capital refers to shared social norms, cultural values, and reciprocity in family systems, which often are measured by the structure of the family network, family support, family interaction, and quality of relationships among family members [30]. For rural Chinese older adults, their traditional multigenerational living arrangement and family social capital have undergone great transitions due to rural-to-urban migration, modernization, and urbanization in the past few decades. Because millions of working-age rural adults left their hometowns to work in urban cities, community social capital might be more important in older rural adults’ lives by providing instrumental and emotional support, a sense of bonding, and meaning in life.

Community social capital and life satisfaction

Empirical evidence has shown that higher levels of community social capital were associated with better life satisfaction among older adults in East Asian countries and regions [31-34]. In particular, cognitive social capital was found to have higher impacts on life satisfaction than structural social capital, whereas the findings of previous studies on structural social capital and life satisfaction were mixed [27, 35, 36]. For example, a latent variable of social capital that included both social trust (i.e., an indicator of the cognitive dimension of social capital) and structural social capital indicators (e.g., social participation) was found to be significantly associated with life satisfaction among adults aged 65 or older in Gyeonggi Province, South Korea [32]. Using a global measure of social capital (i.e., social trust, social network, and social participation), a recent empirical study identified a significant relationship between social capital and life satisfaction among adults aged 80 or older in 14 villages of Jinhua, Zhejiang Province, China [33]. Furthermore, cognitive social capital, rather than structural social capital, was significantly associated with life satisfaction in the Chinese context [9].

Community social capital could enhance older adults’ life satisfaction through information sharing of health-related services and resources and the promotion of community service utilization [37, 38]. Better community social capital could also promote feelings of respect, appreciation, and caring. These factors were found to be significantly associated with older adults’ self-worth and self-esteem, which could further promote their life satisfaction [27, 39].

The moderating role of family social capital

As previously discussed, for older adults, family social capital and community social capital are two major sources that could improve their lives, and the two dimensions of social capital are closely related [40]. Given the crucial role of the traditional culture of Confucianism and filial piety in Chinese society, most older Chinese adults consider good-quality family relationships as a crucial indicator of meaning in life and put great emphasis on emotional and instrumental support from their adult children [41, 42]. Literature has showed that family social capital was positively associated with older adults’ subjective well-being outcomes, including life satisfaction [19, 30]. Given older rural Chinese adults tend to have lower socioeconomic status and receive less health care and public services than their urban counterparts, family social capital can be particularly important for older adults in rural China.

On the other hand, as previously discussed, the traditional family structure and support system have changed significantly: Millions of working-age adults moved from rural villages to urban regions for better income and employment, which means that many older rural adults have been left behind in rural areas. This rural-to-urban migration phenomenon has had a significant influence on the traditional multigenerational household structure and weakened its role in the aging support system in rural China. Although rural pension and health care systems have developed significantly since the early 2000s and reached comprehensive coverage in rural China, the benefits of these systems are still relatively low as compared with those of the urban systems [15, 16].

There are two competing hypotheses: The first is that community social capital could be particularly important for those with poor family social capital to sustain their well-being (including life satisfaction). The second is that older adults with poor family social capital cannot benefit from good-quality community social capital. The examination of the two hypotheses cannot ignore the surrounding social contexts. After all, social capital is a contextual factor that can be used to facilitate community service utilization and information transferring, rather than replace the function of community service and social infrastructure.

Regarding the former hypothesis, it could be valid in social contexts with a relatively advanced social welfare system and social infrastructure [43]. Regarding the latter hypothesis, it could be valid in developing countries and regions such as rural China. Given that social resources and welfare systems are still developing in rural areas of Northeast China, we hypothesized that family social capital would play a moderating role in the association between community social capital (including cognitive and structural social capital) and life satisfaction among older people living in rural Northeast China. Specifically, both cognitive and structural social capital would have greater effects on life satisfaction among older adults with relatively high levels of family social capital.

Sampling

Data were based on the Social Capital and Aging Life-Quality Survey, a social survey that gathered information on the social capital and well-being of around 480 respondents aged 60 or older in rural communities of Liaoyuan, Jilin Province, in late 2019. Jilin is one of three provinces in Northeast China. The proportion of the local older population (i.e., aged 60 or older) was higher than the national average (23.1% vs. 17%, respectively). In 2019, around 50% of the local population held an agricultural household registration status.

This survey used a quota sampling design. In the first stage, 16 village communities were randomly selected from the village list of Dongliao County in the Liaoyuan region (total villages = 235). In the second stage, 30 respondents were recruited from each of the 16 selected village communities based on the recommendations of rural village committees. The inclusion criteria were as follows: the respondents needed to be aged 60 or older, have a local agricultural household registration status (i.e., hukou status), and have lived in the local community for more than 180 days in the past year. We also controlled the age and gender ratio of the respondents according to the statistics from the sixth national census.

Face-to-face interviews were conducted by six trained interviewers at either community centers or respondents’ homes. The response rates exceeded 90% in all villages. Furthermore, the respondents were asked to take a cognitive function test using the Short Portable Mental Status Questionnaire [44]. The cutoff point was 7 for those with a college education or higher and 6 for those with a high school education or lower. We excluded those who did not pass the cognitive function test or had missing values for age, gender, and family social capital (i.e., the moderator), generating a final analytic sample of 455. Ethical approval was obtained from the Ethics Committee of the University of Hong Kong.

Measurement

Regarding life satisfaction, it was measured by the Life Satisfaction Scale for Chinese Elders [13]. This scale contained items of important life domains in later life (e.g., spousal relationship, family relationships, friend relationships, financial status, housing, and food). Responses were assessed on a 5-point Likert scale (1 = very unsatisfied, 3 = fair, 5 = very satisfied). Average scores were calculated to represent life satisfaction levels (Cronbach’s α = .851).

Community social capital was conceptualized as cognitive and structural dimensions of social capital. Cognitive social capital was measured by four items. The first item referenced social trust in the community (i.e., “The majority of local residents can be trusted”); the second and third items reflected reciprocity among neighbors in the community (i.e., “Local residents care about not only their own interests, but also others” and “The majority of local residents are willing to provide support to you when necessary”); and the last item was about feelings of belonging (i.e., “If the local community is a big family, I feel that I am a member of the family”). The respondents were asked whether they agreed with these four statements (1 = strongly disagree, 3 = neutral, 5 = strongly agree). We calculated the average scores of the four items to represent the levels of cognitive social capital (Cronbach’s α = .897).

Structural social capital was measured by four indicators. The first was the number of organizational memberships. The respondents were asked whether they held memberships in the following organizations in the past 12 months: political parties, women’s groups, charity groups, religious groups, sports groups, professional associations, neighborhood committees, and community associations (0 = no, 1 = yes). The responses were summed to represent the number of organizational memberships. Social participation was measured by the frequency of the respondents’ participation in social activities held by these organizations in the past 12 months (1 = never, 3 = a few times per year, 5 = once per week, 6 = twice per week or more). Finally, the respondents were asked whether they had participated in any volunteering activity and collaborated with other residents to solve common problems in their local community (0 = no, 1 = yes).

In this study, the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support was used to measure family social capital [45]. The scale contained four items: (a) My family members are willing to support me when necessary; (b) I can discuss my problems with my family members; (c) I can receive emotional support from my family members; and (4) My family members were willing to help me to make decisions in important issues. The responses were assessed by a 5-point Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree, 3 = neutral, 5 = strongly agree). The average scores were calculated to represent the level of family social capital (Cronbach’s α = .876).

Finally, the respondents’ sociodemographic characteristics, socioeconomic status, family characteristics, and health status were treated as covariates in this study. Age was assessed in years. Gender, marital status, living arrangement, and education were recoded as binary variables (1 = female, 0 = male; 1 = married, 0 = other marital status; 1 = lived alone, 0 = lived with others; 1 = primary school education or higher, 0 = no formal education). We calculated the log value of household income per year to represent the income level. We summed the number of sons and daughters to represent number of children. The Lawton Instrumental Activities of Daily Living scale was used to measure instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs) [46]. The respondents were asked to evaluate their difficulty levels in conducting activities in daily life, such as housekeeping, managing finance, managing medicine, preparing food, using telephone, going shopping, and using transportation (0 = not difficult, 1 = difficult, 2 = very difficult). The average scores were calculated to represent the difficulty levels in conducting these IADLs (Cronbach’s α = .871).

Data analysis

Multiple linear regression models were used to examine the proposed hypotheses. The analytic procedures were as follows. The covariates were added in Model 1. In Model 2, cognitive social capital and structural social capital (i.e., community social capital) were added, controlling for the covariates. Family social capital was added in Model 3 to examine its relationship with life satisfaction when community social capital and covariates were entered in the model. In Model 4, four interaction terms (community social capital indicators by family social capital) were added to examine the moderating role of family social capital in the relationship between community social capital and life satisfaction in later life. To reduce the issue of multicollinearity, all interaction terms were mean centered.

Variance inflation factor was used to examine multicollinearity in the regression models. Because the missing rates of all key variables were lower than 5%, listwise deletion was used in this study. Data analysis was conducted using IBM SPSS Statistics 19.

Descriptive statistics

The results of the descriptive analysis showed that around two thirds of the respondents were between 60 and 69 years old. About half were men (51.2%); 70.5% were married and lived with their spouses; and 15.2% lived alone. More than one third of the respondents did not receive any formal education, and more than half reported that their annual household income was less than 10,000 RMB. Regarding their health status, around 15% had difficulty completing at least one IADL task and 41.8% considered their health status as very poor, poor, or fair. On average, respondents had 2.4 adult children at the time of survey (see Table 1).

[Insert Table 1 about here]

Regression models of social capital and life satisfaction

Table 2 presents the results of regression models of social capital and life satisfaction among older adults in rural Chinese contexts. All variance inflation factor values were lower than 5, indicating no multicollinearity issue in this model. Covariates were entered in Model 1. The results showed that being female (b = -0.167, SE = 0.048, β = -.174, p < .01), living alone (b = -0.184, SE = 0.077, β = -.140, p < .05), and having difficulty with IADLs (b = -0.276, SE = 0.083, β = -.166, p < .01) were negatively associated with life satisfaction. Community-based social capital (i.e., cognitive and structural dimensions) were entered in Model 2. The results show that cognitive social capital was positively associated with life satisfaction (b = 0.426, SE = 0.040, β = .455, p < .001). All structural social capital indicators were not associated with life satisfaction when cognitive social capital and covariates were entered in the model (all p > .05). Family social capital was added in Model 3. The results show that family social capital was positively associated with life satisfaction (b = 0.269, SE = 0.047, β = .320, p < .001). Furthermore, community-based social capital was still significantly associated with life satisfaction when family social capital was entered in the model (b = 0.229, SE = 0.052, β = .245, p < .001). The adjusted variance increased from .093 in Model 1 to .340 in Model 3.

[Insert Table 2 about here]

Table 3 presented the results of the regression model with interaction terms. To reduce the issue of multicollinearity, all four interaction terms (i.e., social capital indicators by family social capital) were mean centered. The results show that family social capital had a significant moderating effect on the relationships between cognitive social capital and life satisfaction (b = 0.246, SE = 0.047, β = .214, p < .001) and between social participation and life satisfaction (b = 0.061, SE = 0.030, β = .113, p < .05).

[Insert Table 3 about here]

We also conducted additional analysis by examining the relationship between community-based social capital and life satisfaction in two samples separately (i.e., lower and higher family social capital; see Table 4). The results show that cognitive social capital (b = 0.509, SE = 0.098, β = .360, p < .001) and social participation (b = 0.074, SE = 0.033, β = .228, p < .05) were significantly associated with life satisfaction in the higher family social capital group. However, cognitive social capital (b = 0.051, SE = 0.056, β = .058, p > .05) and social participation (b = 0.002, SE = 0.016, β = .010, p > .05) were not associated with life satisfaction in the lower family social capital group.

The present research is one of the first attempts to test the moderating role of family social capital in the relationship between community social capital and life satisfaction in rural China. The results of the study represent new empirical evidence on social capital from a developing area and East Asian cultural perspective. The findings could help intervention designers and policy makers understand the effects of social determinants on life satisfaction in later life.

Consistent with previous studies [9, 36], the findings of this study show that cognitive social capital was significantly associated with older adults’ life satisfaction, whereas all structural social capital indicators were not associated with life satisfaction in the overall sample. It is important to note that previous studies have identified group differences in the relationship between social capital and life satisfaction [9, 34]. This study made new contribution by testing the moderating effect of family social capital in the associations between cognitive social capital, structural social capital, and older adults’ life satisfaction in rural China. Both cognitive social capital and social participation (an indicator of structural social capital) in the community were significantly associated with life satisfaction in the higher family social capital group. In contrast, both indicators had no significant effect on the life satisfaction of older adults with lower levels of family social capital.

There are several potential theoretical explanations for these findings. First, this might be partially because these older adults with poor family social capital did not have adequate resources to share and exchange in local communities. They tended to not only have low levels of education and income throughout their life course, but also be unable to receive support and resources from their family members. Moreover, the benefits of local social welfare systems might not be adequate to meet their social and medical needs.

Another potential explanation is that poor family social capital might make older adults feel they are “losing face” in local communities. They were also more likely to have lower social status in their neighborhood because of their lack of family support. These factors might have adverse effects on social interactions and reciprocal exchanges in local communities. In contrast, older adults with good family social capital were more likely to receive emotional support and other supportive resources from their families, which might have allowed them to become more confident in social engagement and conduct social exchanges with their neighbors. Under such circumstances, community social capital might not be useful for those with poor family social capital but functions in a more effective manner for those with good family social capital.

The results of the present study have important intervention and policy implications. First, family social capital could be an indicator to identify populations with high risk of mental health issues in rural communities. Community-dwelling older adults with lower family social capital might not only have lower life satisfaction, but also have difficulty receiving benefits from community social capital. Second, future social capital policy and intervention development in rural China should pay particular attention to older adults with poor family social capital and provide more adaptive services and interventions for these population. For example, motivational interviewing techniques could be used to enhance these older adults’ motivation toward social participation. Process evaluation of present community activities could also be conducted to identify potential barriers for these older adults to participate in and benefit from these activities. Furthermore, intergenerational programs (e.g., both familial and nonfamilial) could be implemented to promote interactions across generations in these villages. Peer support groups could be used to promote interactions and reciprocal exchanges between young-old (i.e., age between 60 and 74 years) and old-old adults (i.e. age 75 years and older). These activities are cost effective. They could be used to promote the quality of social interactions and further enhance older adults’ cognitive social capital, including but not limited to social trust, reciprocity, and a feeling of belonging to the community through these activities. Third, policy advocacy should be conducted to reduce the income disparity between rural and urban areas, particularly in terms of social infrastructure, health care resources, and social welfare benefits. This is consistent with common prosperity, one of the most important policy goals in modern Chinese society.

The present study had several limitations. First, the nature of cross-sectional data means that we could not examine the causal relationships among community social capital, family social capital, and life satisfaction. However, previous studies have shown that community cognitive and structural social capital had significant effects on older adults’ mental health, such as life satisfaction and depression [27, 39]. Future longitudinal panel studies should be conducted to examine the causal relationships among these variables. Second, this survey used quota sampling to recruit respondents. Although we controlled for age and sex ratio according the latest population census at the time of survey, the sample was not randomly selected, which could affect the empirical generalization of the findings. The empirical evidence from this study can only be applied to older adults in similar economic and social contexts. Third, the present study only focused on individual-level community social capital and did not test collective-level community social capital. Future studies with larger samples should focus on both individual-level and collective-level community social capital and further test their relationships with life satisfaction in later life.

The present study examined the moderation role of family social capital in the association between community social capital (including cognitive and structural social capital), and life satisfaction in later life in rural areas of Northeast China. The findings suggest that in the overall sample, cognitive social capital, but not structural social capital, was significantly associated with life satisfaction in later life. We conducted further analysis by testing the moderating role of family social capital in these relationships and found that cognitive social capital and social participation (an indicator of structural social capital) were significantly associated with life satisfaction among older adults with higher family social capital only.

In other words, the promotion of community social capital could play an important role in enhancing older adults’ life satisfaction through helping them foster social trust with others living in the community, promote their willingness to help and cooperate with neighbors, and improve their feelings of belongingness in their communities. On the other hand, older adults with poor family social capital might have difficulty fulfilling their filial expectations and receiving adequate instrumental and emotional support from their family members. Of note, community social capital might not function well for those with poor family social capital in rural Chinese contexts, who might be at higher risk of poor general well-being. Intervention designers and policymakers should pay particular attention to older adults with poor family social capital and implement adaptive strategies to remove barriers to participation and reciprocity in community activities; promote their social trust, reciprocity, and feeling of belonging in the community; and improve community service quality, social infrastructure, and welfare benefits in the long run.

S.E.: Standardized error;

β: Beta;

IADL: Instrumental activities of daily living.

Funding: This study was supported by the Jilin Social Science Foundation of China “Research on the Constructing of Age-friendly Community Social Capital in Jilin Province”. This organization had no role in the research design, data collection, data analysis, manuscript writing, and submission.

Availability of data and materials: The datasets analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Ethics approval and consent to participate: Ethics approval has been obtained from the Ethics Committee of the University of Hong Kong (reference no. EA2003026). Informed consent forms were obtained before data collection. The data used in this study was anonymised before its use. All methods were carried out in accordance with relevant guidelines and regulations in the Declaration of Helsinki.

Acknowledgements: Not applicable.

Consent for publication: Not applicable.

Competing interests: The authors declare that they have no competing interests. One of the co-authors is an editorial board member of BMC Geriatrics.

Authors’ information: JZ (PhD) is an associate professor of Department of Sociology, School of Philosophy and Sociology, Jilin University.

NL (PhD) is an associate professor of the Department of Social Work and Social Policy, School of Sociology and Population Studies, Renmin University of China.

Authors' contributions: Jingyue Zhang wrote and revised the paper, and conducted statistical analysis. Nan Lu contributed to study planning, data collection, statistical analysis, and paper writing and revision. The work has not been accepted or published elsewhere in whole or in part. Both authors have contributed significantly to the work and approved the final manuscript.

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Table 1 Sample characteristics (n = 455)

	n (%)	Mean (SD)
Age		69.4 (6.2)
60–64 years	99 (21.8)
65–69 years	171 (37.6)
70-74 years	102 (22.4)
75-79 years	46 (10.1)
80 years and older	37 (8.1)
Gender
Female	222 (48.8)
Male	233 (51.2)
Marital status
Being married	321 (70.5)
Other marital status	134 (29.5)
Educational attainment
Did not receive formal education	167 (36.7)
Primary school or higher degrees	288 (63.3)
Household annual income		15559.3 (16536.6)
10,000 RMB or lower	238 (52.3)
Higher than 10,000 RMB	217 (47.7)
Self-rated health status
Very poor/poor/fair	190 (41.8)
Good/very good	264 (58.0)
Did not have difficulty in completing IADLs tasks	384(84.4)
Lived alone	69 (15.2)
Number of adult children		2.4 (1.3)

Notes: IADLs = Instrumental Activities of Daily Living.

Table 2 Regression model of social capital and life satisfaction of older adults living in rural China

		1			2			3
	B	S.E.	β	B	S.E.	β	B	S.E.	β
Constant	4.371	0.435	-	2.186	0.438	-	1.770	0.428	-
Age	-0.007	0.005	-0.093	-0.005	0.004	-0.060	-0.003	0.004	-0.040
Gender	-0.167	0.048	-0.174^**	-0.120	0.043	-0.125^**	-0.101	0.042	-0.105^*
Marital status	-0.038	0.064	-0.037	0.025	0.057	0.024	0.025	0.055	0.024
Education	0.058	0.049	0.058	0.052	0.044	0.052	0.036	0.042	0.036
Income	0.032	0.026	0.063	0.044	0.023	0.088	0.044	0.022	0.088
Living alone	-0.184	0.077	-0.140^*	-0.098	0.069	-0.074	-0.090	0.066	-0.068
IADLs	-0.276	0.083	-0.166^**	-0.225	0.074	-0.136^**	-0.216	0.071	-0.130^**
Number of children	0.027	0.022	0.074	0.014	0.020	0.038	0.000	0.019	0.001
Cognitive social capital				0.426	0.040	0.455^***	0.229	0.052	0.245^***
Organization membership				-0.036	0.036	-0.057	-0.020	0.035	-0.031
Social participation				0.015	0.016	0.055	0.015	0.016	0.055
Volunteering				-0.012	0.083	-0.006	-0.036	0.080	-0.019
Citizenship activities				0.043	0.059	0.034	0.051	0.057	0.040
Family social capital							0.269	0.047	0.320^***
Adjusted R-square	0.093			0.287			0.340

Notes: *p<0.05; **p<0.01; ***p<0.001. Durbin-Watson estimate = 1.936.

Table 3 Regression model of social capital and life satisfaction with interaction terms

		1			2
	B	S.E.	β	B	S.E.	β
Constant	3.964	0.375	-	3.947	0.364	-
Age	-0.003	0.004	-0.040	-0.004	0.004	-0.053
gender	-0.101	0.042	-0.105^*	-0.083	0.040	-0.087^*
Marital status	0.025	0.055	0.024	0.028	0.053	0.027
Education	0.036	0.042	0.036	0.036	0.041	0.036
Income	0.044	0.022	0.088	0.047	0.022	0.093^*
Living alone	-0.090	0.066	-0.068	-0.137	0.065	-0.104^*
IADLs	-0.216	0.071^**	-0.130	-0.194	0.069	-0.117^**
Number of children	0.000	0.019	0.001	0.003	0.019	0.009
Cognitive social capital	0.229	0.052^***	0.245	0.242	0.051	0.259^***
Organization membership	-0.020	0.035	-0.031	-0.034	0.035	-0.054
Social participation	0.015	0.016	0.055	0.029	0.016	0.103
Volunteering	-0.036	0.080	-0.019	-0.017	0.079	-0.009
Citizenship activity	0.051	0.057	0.040	0.019	0.058	0.015
Family social capital	0.269	0.047^***	0.320	0.303	0.047	0.360^***
Cognitive social capital X Family social capital				0.246	0.047	0.214^***
Organization Membership X Family social capital				-0.074	0.063	-0.065
Social participation X Family social capital				0.061	0.030	0.113^*
Citizenship activities X Family social capital				-0.143	0.110	-0.059
Adjusted R-square	0.340			0.382

Notes: *p<0.05; **p<0.01; ***p<0.001. Durbin-Watson estimate = 2.007.

Table 4 Regression model of social capital and life satisfaction in two family social capital groups

	Lower family social capital group			Higher family social capital group
	B	SE	β	B	SE	β
Constant	3.128	0.463	-	2.372	0.832	-
Age	-0.003	0.005	-0.057	-0.007	0.008	-0.093
Gender	-0.106	0.044	-0.156^*	-0.107	0.077	-0.104
Marital status	0.054	0.059	0.074	-0.017	0.099	-0.016
Education	0.023	0.045	0.034	0.053	0.078	0.049
Income	0.082	0.025	0.221^**	0.022	0.040	0.043
Living alone	-0.132	0.072	-0.148	-0.165	0.119	-0.113
IADLs	-0.269	0.091	-0.194^**	-0.196	0.110	-0.129
Number of children	0.039	0.021	0.144	-0.017	0.033	-0.046
Cognitive social capital	0.051	0.056	0.058	0.509	0.098	0.360^***
Organization membership	-0.023	0.034	-0.056	-0.072	0.073	-0.091
Social participation	0.002	0.016	0.010	0.074	0.033	0.228^*
Volunteering	-0.051	0.090	-0.037	0.007	0.141	0.004
Citizenship activities	0.102	0.055	0.120	-0.168	0.126	-0.111
Adjusted R-square	0.170			0.189

Notes: *p<0.05; **p<0.01; ***p<0.001. Lower family social capital group：Durbin-Watson estimate = 1.971; Higher family social capital group：Durbin-Watson estimate = 1.952.

Competing interest reported. The authors declare that they have no competing interests. One of the co-authors is an editorial board member of BMC Geriatrics.

The Moderating Role of Family Social Capital in the Relationship between Community Social Capital and Life Satisfaction among Older Adults in Northeast Rural China

Status:

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Abstract

Background

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion

Abbreviations

Declarations

References

Tables

Additional Declarations

Status:

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