Taking care of your parents or elderly family members might have damaging effects. New research from Singapore reveals that social support may increase the risk of depression by boosting feelings of helplessness in seniors.
Numerous studies have shown the benefits of social support on senior health. However, the latest study reveals that social support does nothing, and may even negatively affect mental health among recipients. Researchers at Duke-NUS Medical School said that the latest findings are important because it can explain the ambiguous effect social support has on Singaporean elderly.
The latest study involved survey data from 2,766 individuals aged 62 to 97 participating in the Panel of Health and Aging in Singaporean Elderly (PHASE). While social support such as receiving money, food clothing and housework services significantly reduced the number of depressive symptoms among seniors, it also significantly reduced feelings of control. Researchers noted that the women experienced more feelings of loss of self-control after receiving social support.
"Depressive symptoms for females may be more sensitive to received social support than males, which may be due to gendered pathways and expectations of support. This study highlights the need to further examine both the beneficial and detrimental effects of received social support on psychological health in tandem, considering the effect of mediating variables such as personal mastery to understand its nuanced pathways," researchers wrote in the study.
Study authors Rahul Malhotra and Shannon Ang from the Centre for Ageing Research and Education (CARE) found that the feeling of losing self-control actually cancelled out the benefits of social support by increasing depressive symptoms in seniors.
"While receiving social support may help older people feel a sense of belonging or enhance their relationship closeness with the provider, it can also impact them negatively because it reduces their sense of control over their own lives," Ang said in a university release.
The latest findings are interesting because they go against the traditional notion that more social support is always beneficial.
"Our findings have implications for policy-makers because it points toward the importance of crafting policies and encouraging ways to provide support to older persons that can help them maintain their sense of control over their own lives," Malhotra added.
The findings were published in the March 2016 issue of the journal Social Science and Medicine.
