Socioeconomic correlates of social asymmetry in English older adults: findings from a population-based cohort study
Bill Calvey, James Laurence, Joanna McHugh PowerAbstract
Objectives
Discrepancies between subjective loneliness and objective social isolation (i.e., social asymmetry) are linked to physical and psychological health in later life, but socioeconomic correlates of social asymmetry remain underexplored. We examined whether individual- and area-level socioeconomic indicators were longitudinally associated with social asymmetry in English older adults.
Methods
Data were drawn from 8,164 adults (aged 60+) participating in Waves 7–9 (2014–2019) of the English Longitudinal Study on Ageing. Social asymmetry was operationalized as a continuous discrepancy score between standardized loneliness and social isolation, with positive values indicating social resilience (i.e., lower loneliness relative to isolation) and negative values indicating social vulnerability (i.e., higher loneliness relative to isolation). Time-varying generalized estimating equations assessed longitudinal associations between social asymmetry and socioeconomic indicators.
Results
All socioeconomic indicators were associated with social asymmetry, even after adjusting for psychological covariates. Third-level education (β = 0.44, p < .001), higher household income (β = 0.22, p < .001), and subjective social status (β = 0.004, p < .001) were associated with social resilience. Conversely, individual- (β = −0.04, p < .001) and area-level deprivation (β = −0.20, p < .001), population density (β = −0.18, p < .001), rare/no internet use (β = −0.26, p < .001), unemployment (β = −0.07, p < .05), and renting in either private (β = −0.35, p < .001) or social housing (β = −0.41, p < .001) were associated with social vulnerability.
Discussion
Addressing loneliness in later life may require interventions that target broader community-level socioeconomic inequalities and extend beyond individual behavioral change.