Social Relationships Flashcards
Hummer, Ellison, Rogers, Moulton, & Romero. (2004). Religious involvement and adult mortality in the United States: Review and perspective.
Gist: Review of literature on relationship btw religious involvement & adult mortality risk in U.S. Overall, religious involvement is related to adult mortality risk, and evidence is strongest for public religious attendance and across specific religious denominations. Evidence is weakest for private religious activity. Mechanisms may be social: social integration, social regulation, & psychological resources.
1) Examine key findings & describe indicators: (a) Some research on comparing denominations from 70s & 80s; (b) most research is on public religious attendance & mortality (more frequent attendance = lower mortality risk); in 2 population studies, religious attendance had moderate & graded relationship w/mortality (different magnitudes for different causes); (c) evidence for subgroup differences - stronger relative differences in attendance-mortality relationship for younger adults, women, & blacks; (d) private religious activity & mortality - unclear evidence (some finds lower mortality for people privately religious, other research finds no effect); clinical studies had mixed findings as well; ambiguity may be related to many types of private religious activity, lack of adequate measures in large data sets, lack of national level data that have been examined.
2) Review potential mechanisms: (a) Social integration - refers to social ties & support from involvement; have more friendship networks & integrated within community; indirectly via propensities for marriage; formally sponsor health-related social events; resource for basic needs; (b) Social regulation - shape norms of members through behavioral regulations specified through sacred teachings, reinforced by congregational leaders, & solidified via social interactions in religious community; (c) Spiritual benefits - more coherent world view & ease impact of stressful life events.
3) Highlight key critiques: (a) not controlling for selectivity/confounding; (b) most research on public attendance as a measure of religious involvement; (c) denominational variation not adequately measured; (d) lack of studies making multiple comparisons (small cell sizes); (e) lack of population-level data; (f) inconsistent findings in literature; (g) implications for provisions of health care.
Musick, House, & Williams. (2004). Attendance at religious services and mortality in a national sample.
Gist: Estimate impact of service attendance on mortality in a national sample & provide empirical examination of potential mechanisms. Consistent with prior research, find that 20-30% of religious attendance effect on mortality explained by better health behaviors among attendees. Religious beliefs & behaviors (volunteering for church, private religious activity, subjective religiosity/comfort, negative justice, fatalism) did not explain & often suppressed association between attendance & mortality. They are strong correlates with attendance. Private religiosity had strongest suppression effect (perhaps adults with need of comfort/interaction provided by private religious activity are in greater need of comfort due to health conditions). Attending once a month or more was better than not attending but attending once a week or more was only marginally better (weaker relationship with increased frequency?).
Costa & Kahn. (2010). Health, wartime stress, and unit cohesion: Evidence from union army veterans.
Gist: Union Army veterans of American Civil War (faced greater wartime stress as measured by higher battlefield mortality rates) had higher mortality rates at older ages. Men from cohesive companies were less likely to be affected by wartime stress. Found true for all-cause mortality and mortality from ischemic heart disease and stroke, and new diagnoses of arteriosclerosis.
Patterson & Veenstra. (2010). Loneliness and risk of mortality: A longitudinal investigation in Alameda County, California.
Gist: Investigated prospective impact of self-reported loneliness on all-cause mortality and mortality from ischemic disease and other cardiovascular diseases. Controlling for age & gender, chances of all-cause mortality higher in people reporting often feel lonely compared to those never feel lonely. Loneliness not associated with ischemic heart disease mortality but was associated with mortality from other circulatory system mortality. Physical activity & depression may be mediators of the loneliness-mortality association. Both chronic loneliness & relatively recent changes in feelings of loneliness both increase risk of mortality.
Blanchard, Bartkowski, Matthews, & Kerley. (2008). Faith, morality and mortality: The ecological impact of religion on population health.
Gist: Ecological research on religion has two key shortcomings: (1) conducted in atheoretical manner & (2) employs crude methodological techniques that overlook distinctions by affiliations. Hypothesize that other-worldly theology & individualistic orientation found in conservative Protestantism areas dampens faith tradition’s commitment to pop. health. In turn, related to higher risk of mortality. Other-worldly orientation weakens level of collective efficacy & undermines efforts to develop a health care infrastructure. Suspect important distinctions by subgroup of conservative Protestants (evangelicals, Pentecostals, fundamentalists). Presence of mainline Protestant & Catholic congregations associated w/lower mortality rates because worldly orientation encourages development of network ties to secular organizations & facilitates investments in public goods. Theoretically, identified 3 important subcultures within Conservative Protestant tradition: although all other-worldly orientated, Evangelicals had lower mortality rates & Fundamentalist & Pentecostal had higher mortality rates. Based on this evidence, future research must challenge the monolithic bloc fallacy of Conservative Protestantism (i.e., more heterogeneity than previous researchers expected).
Dupre, Franzese, & Parrado. (2006). Religious attendance and mortality: Implications for the black-white mortality crossover.
Gist: Investigates relationships among religious attendance, mortality, & the black-white mortality crossover. Find a strong negative association btw attendance & mortality. Show evidence of racial crossover for both men & women. For women, effect of attendance is race- & age-dependent. For men, effect of attendance not related to race & doesn’t alter crossover pattern. When other health risks in model (in terms of differential frailty), find neither race nor age-related effects.
1) Overall, find blacks have higher mortality rates than whites; the age-specific rates reverse at older ages for men & women.
2) Frequent attendance (once week or more) an important predictor of survival among older adults (reduced by accounting for health practices, but still robust for men & women).
3) Attenuation of religion effect greater for men than for women.
4) When attendance modeled as component of population heterogeneity (frailty), significant effects only found for women. Race-& age-dependent effects of religion translate into 10-year difference in age at which racial gap in mortality reverses for women. Little/no religious involvement prolongs mortality disadvantaged for black women.
5) Religious attendance does not modify age at which crossover occurs for men.
Hummer, Rogers, Nam, & Ellison. (1999). Religious involvement and U.S. adult mortality.
Gist: Used national data to explore association of religious attendance & sociodemographic, health, & behavioral correlations with overall & cause-specific mortality. Religious attendance associated w/adult mortality in graded fashion. Health selectivity explains portion of effect (people who do not attend church/religious services more likely to be unhealthy). Religious attendance mediated by social ties (marital status, social activity) & behavioral factors (smoking, weight-for-height) to decrease risks of death. Magnitude of association btw religious attendance & mortality varies by cause of death, but direction consistent.
Idler. (2011). Religion and adult mortality: Group- and individual-level perspectives.
Gist: Reviews literature on religion & mortality to assess existence & strength of association and describes evidence of mechanisms with attention to social control of unhealthy behaviors.
1) Social regulation effects stronger & more consistent for religious groups w/distinctive lifestyle characteristics (e.g., Mormons, Seventh Day Adventists) than the general population; weaker effects for cardiovascular outcomes than all-cause mortality.
2) Behavioral variables (e.g., smoking, overweight, alcohol use, cholesterol, diabetes, BMI, blood pressure, age).
3) Issue of whether covariates are confounders (covary w/IV & cause change in DV) or are mediators (caused by IV & have subsequent effect on DV). Physical condition variables may be confounders - poor health associated w/lower religious attendance & mortality.
4) Gender differences may be explained by mediating behavioral variables (e.g., smoking).
Luo, Hawkley, Waite, & Cacioppo. (2012). Loneliness, health, and mortality in old age: A national longitudinal study.
Gist: Estimated effect of loneliness on mortality & examined mechanisms of social relationships, health behaviors, & health outcomes. Health outcomes included depressive symptoms, SRH, & functional limitations. Loneliness was associated with mortality risk & this effect was not explained by social relationships or health behaviors. It was only modestly explained by health outcomes. In reciprocal prospective effects of loneliness & health, loneliness both affected and was affected by depressive symptoms & functional limitations over time (only marginally with SRH).
Manzoli, Villari, Pirone, & Boccia. (2007). Marital status and mortality in the elderly: A systematic review and meta-analysis.
Gist: Relationship btw marital status & mortality long been recognized, but no studies on strength of association. In meta-analysis, seek to produce overall estimate of excess mortality associated w/being unmarried in aged individuals & evaluate whether & to what degree marriage differs with respect to gender, geographical/cultural context, type of non-married condition, & study methodological quality.
1) Overall relative risk for married vs. non-married 0.88.
2) No variations by gender, study quality, or btw Europe vs. North America.
3) compared to married individuals, widowed had RR of death of 1.11, divorced/separated 1.16, never married 1.11.
4) Little change in relative risk (slightly reduced) when comparing by methodologies.
Rendall, Weden, Favreault, & Waldron. (2011). The protective effect of marriage for survival: A review and update.
Gist: Theory that marriage has protective effects for survival has been around more than 100 years, since Durkheim. However, research inconsistent when looking at differences in protective effect by gender, age, & in contrast to different unmarried statuses. Current authors find consistent survival advantage for married over unmarried men & women, & an additional survival “premium” for married men. Little evidence for mortality differences btw never-married, divorced/separated, & widowed.
Sullivan. (2010). Mortality differentials and religion in the United States: Religious affiliation and attendance.
Gist: Examined relationship btw religious affiliation & adult mortality. Investigated mediating roles of SES (education, household wealth), attendance at religious services, or health behaviors. SES explained some but not all of effect. Catholics, Evangelical Protestants, & Black Protestants benefit from favorable attendance patterns but lack of attendance at services explains much of higher mortality of those with no religious preference. Health behaviors did not mediate except with Evangelical Protestants. Future research needs to consider differences by religious affiliation.
Shor et al. (2012). Widowhood and mortality: A meta-analysis and meta-regression.
Gist: Study of spousal bereavement & mortality has not explored moderating factors (e.g., age, follow-up duration, geographic region). This review/meta-analysis finds that widowers have higher hazard ratio than married people, adjusting for age & other covariates. HR higher for men than for women. Interaction between gender & mean age, meaning hazard ratios decrease more rapidly for men than for women as age increases. Other predictors were sample size, geographic region, level of statistical adjustment, & study quality.
