| 其他摘要 | Depressive symptoms have become an important health problem threatening the middle-aged and elderly population in China, which seriously affects their quality of life and the realization of the goal of active aging in China. The positive effects of social participation on mental health problems, including depressive symptoms, have been widely documented. With the rapid development of digital technology, the penetration rate of the Internet among middle-aged and elderly people has increased rapidly. As a new form of social participation and interaction, online social participation has attracted increasing attention for its impact and significance on the mental health of middle-aged and older adults. In the context of the rapid development and interwoven development of "new" technology and "old" aging, it is particularly important to investigate the impact and mechanism of online social participation on mental health of middle-aged and elderly people, and to propose corresponding intervention strategies accordingly. In this study, three substudies using database and self-collected data were conducted to examine the relationship between online social participation and depressive symptoms, and their mediating mechanism from self-determination perspective, as well as the moderating effect of social network size on the above mediating effect.
In Study 1，three waves of tracking data (2013, 2015 and 2018) from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS) database were used. Cross-lagged analysis was used to investigate the interaction between online social participation and depressive symptoms. Through ID matching of three waves of data, 2324 valid samples over 45 years old were obtained. The results showed that after controlling for a range of demographic variables, online social participation had a significant three-round cross-lagged effect on depressive symptoms. Depressive symptoms in 2013 had no significant negative effect on online social participation in 2015, but depressive symptoms in 2015 had a significant negative effect on online social participation in 2018. Online social participation and depressive symptoms showed an interactive relationship, and the effect of online social participation on depressive symptoms was stronger and more stable.
Study 2 tested the applicability of "SNS Older Adults Measure (SNS-OA)" in a community of 816 middle-aged and older adults over 45 years old in China. The results showed that each item of the scale had a good differentiation. Exploratory factor analysis found that the revised scale conformed to the five-factor model; The revised scale had a well goodness of fit, good internal consistency reliability, criterion-related validity and measurement invariance across gender. It provides a suitable measurement tool for the follow-up study to measure online social participation for social purposes.
On the basis of the first two sub-studies, Study 3 was conducted to investigate the mediating mechanism of online social participation and depressive symptoms based on the basic psychological needs satisfaction theory in 1091 middle-aged and elderly people aged over 45 years in the community, and the moderating effect of the existing social network size on the mediating mechanism. First of all, as the core idea of self-determination theory, basic psychological needs satisfaction mediated the relationship between online social participation and depressive symptoms, that was, online social participation reduced depressive symptoms by enhancing the autonomy, competence and relatedness needs satisfaction in middle-aged and elderly people. Secondly, social network size moderated the first half of the mediating effect of "online social participation一satisfaction of basic psychological needs一depressive symptoms". Regardless of social network size, middle-aged and elderly people can improve the satisfaction of basic psychological needs, and then reduce depressive symptoms by increasing the frequency of online social participation. However, compared with individuals with high social network size, the effect was more obvious in middle-aged and elderly people with low social network size. The study also confirmed that social network size moderated the direct relationship between online social participation and depressive symptoms. On the basis of controlling the three basic psychological needs satisfaction, higher frequency of online social participation can alleviate depressive symptoms for middle-aged and elderly people with low social network size. However, for middle-aged and older adults with high social network size, greater online participation was associated with an increased risk of depressive symptoms.
In this paper, three studies were conducted to demonstrate the positive effects, relationship mechanisms and boundary conditions of online social participation on the mental health of middle-aged and elderly people, which expanded the interpretation scope of self-determination theory, and provided further evidence support for social capital theory and activity theory. The findings also provided inspiration for the prevention and clinical intervention of depressive symptoms in middle-aged and elderly people from the perspective of Internet use and social relations. In addition, the revised Chinese version of the "SNS Older Adults Measure" also provided a standardized measurement tool for future research on online participation. |
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