IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp14731.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Economic Gradients in Social Health in Britain

Author

Listed:
  • Kung, Claryn S. J.

    (Monash University)

  • Pudney, Stephen

    (ISER, University of Essex)

  • Shields, Michael A.

    (Monash University)

Abstract

Studies have found that loneliness is as bad as smoking or obesity for mortality risk, and the prevalence of loneliness is predicted to increase with ageing populations, more people living alone, and with chronic health conditions. Despite the substantial literature on loneliness, there is little detailed research on the extent of economic gradients. In this paper we provide this evidence using a sample of around 400,000 respondents (aged 40-70) from the UK Biobank. We focus on differences in loneliness across educational attainment, household income and neighbourhood deprivation, as well as recent major life events including financial difficulties. Using two statistical approaches, we find a substantially higher probability of experiencing loneliness, but also social isolation and a lack of social support, for men and women with low socioeconomic status, even when comparing those residing in the same postcode district. Additionally, the recent experience of financial stress is strongly associated with worse social health. Our results are robust to a panel analysis that accounts for intercorrelations between loneliness, social isolation and lack of social support, and controls for sample attrition.

Suggested Citation

  • Kung, Claryn S. J. & Pudney, Stephen & Shields, Michael A., 2021. "Economic Gradients in Social Health in Britain," IZA Discussion Papers 14731, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14731
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://docs.iza.org/dp14731.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Kristine J. Ajrouch & Alysia Y. Blandon & Toni C. Antonucci, 2005. "Social Networks Among Men and Women: The Effects of Age and Socioeconomic Status," The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, The Gerontological Society of America, vol. 60(6), pages 311-317.
    2. Verena H Menec & Nancy E Newall & Corey S Mackenzie & Shahin Shooshtari & Scott Nowicki, 2019. "Examining individual and geographic factors associated with social isolation and loneliness using Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging (CLSA) data," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(2), pages 1-18, February.
    3. Carina Mood & Jan O. Jonsson, 2016. "The Social Consequences of Poverty: An Empirical Test on Longitudinal Data," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 127(2), pages 633-652, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Vaid, Shashank & Donthu, Naveen, 2023. "When injured product users may also stay satisfied: A macro-level analysis," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 162(C).
    2. Cozac, Marina & Mende, Martin & Scott, Maura L., 2023. "Consumer preferences for fuel snacks at the intersection of caregiving stress and gender," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 159(C).
    3. Tenbensel, Tim & Cumming, Jacqueline & Willing, Esther, 2023. "The 2022 restructure of Aotearoa New Zealand's health system: Will it succeed in advancing equity where others have failed?," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kung, Claryn S.J. & Pudney, Stephen E. & Shields, Michael A., 2022. "Economic gradients in loneliness, social isolation and social support: Evidence from the UK Biobank," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 306(C).
    2. Anusuya Dhar & Judith Needham & Michelle Gibb & Elisabeth Coyne, 2020. "The outcomes and experience of people receiving community‐based nurse‐led wound care: A systematic review," Journal of Clinical Nursing, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 29(15-16), pages 2820-2833, August.
    3. Khairul Amri & Raja Masbar & B. S. Nazamuddin & Hasdi Aimon, 2024. "Does Unemployment Moderate the Effect of Government Expenditure on Poverty? A Cross-Provinces Data Evidence from Indonesia," Economic Studies journal, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences - Economic Research Institute, issue 2, pages 92-113.
    4. Miika Mäki & Anna Erika Hägglund & Anna Rotkirch & Sangita Kulathinal & Mikko Myrskylä, 2022. "Stable marital histories predict happiness and health across educational groups," MPIDR Working Papers WP-2022-035, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany.
    5. Amy Chan Hyung Kim & Jungsu Ryu & Chungsup Lee & Kyung Min Kim & Jinmoo Heo, 2021. "Sport Participation and Happiness Among Older Adults: A Mediating Role of Social Capital," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 22(4), pages 1623-1641, April.
    6. G. Bonanno & L. Chies & E. Podrecca, 2023. "The determinants of poverty exits and entries and the role of social benefits: the Italian case," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 40(3), pages 931-969, October.
    7. Bedük, Selçuk, 2018. "Identifying people in poverty: a multidimensional deprivation measure for the EU," SocArXiv 7prxq, Center for Open Science.
    8. Elizabeth Casabianca & Matija Kovacic, 2022. "Loneliness and health among the elderly.The role of cultural heritage and relationship quality," Working Papers 2022:01, Department of Economics, University of Venice "Ca' Foscari".
    9. Claryn S. J. Kung & Johannes S. Kunz & Michael A. Shields, 2021. "Economic Aspects of Loneliness in Australia," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 54(1), pages 147-163, March.
    10. Sena Kimm Gnangnon, 2021. "Poverty volatility and poverty in developing countries," Economic Affairs, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 41(1), pages 84-95, February.
    11. Ignatius Musambai, 2023. "Relationship between Socio-Demographic Characteristics and Satisfaction in Interpersonal Relationships among Consecrated Religious in Catholic Higher Education Institutions in Lang’ ata Sub-County, ," International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science, International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS), vol. 7(10), pages 1763-1772, October.
    12. Merz, Joachim & Scherg, Bettina, 2021. "Time, Income and Subjective Well-Being - 20 Years of Interdependent Multidimensional Polarization in Germany," IZA Discussion Papers 14870, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Carly Roman & Christopher R. Beam & Elizabeth Zelinski, 2022. "Psychosocial Outcomes of Age Integration Status: Do Age-Integrated Social Networks Benefit Older Adults?," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(19), pages 1-15, September.
    14. Ho, Sin-Yu & Njindan Iyke, Bernard, 2018. "Financial Development, Growth and Poverty Reduction: Evidence from Ghana," MPRA Paper 87121, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Griff Tester & Eric R. Wright, 2017. "Older Gay Men and Their Support Convoys," The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, The Gerontological Society of America, vol. 72(3), pages 488-497.
    16. Bożena Frączek, 2022. "The Use of Cluster Analysis to Assess the Threats of Poverty or Social Exclusion in EU Countries: The Case of People with Disabilities Compared to People without Disabilities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(21), pages 1-13, October.
    17. Kai Wang & Chang Gan & Lijun Chen & Mihai Voda, 2020. "Poor Residents’ Perceptions of the Impacts of Tourism on Poverty Alleviation: From the Perspective of Multidimensional Poverty," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(18), pages 1-18, September.
    18. Sandher, Jeevun, 2022. "Familiar Faces, Worn Out Places: The Effect of Personal and Place Prosperity On Well-Being," SocArXiv am6gq, Center for Open Science.
    19. Beáta Dávid & Boglárka Herke & Éva Huszti & Gergely Tóth & Emese Túry-Angyal & Fruzsina Albert, 2023. "Reshaping Social Capital During the Pandemic Crisis: Age Group Differences in Face‐to‐Face Contact Network Structures," Social Inclusion, Cogitatio Press, vol. 11(1), pages 295-309.
    20. Antonio Acconcia & Maria Carannante & Michelangelo Misuraca & Germana Scepi, 2020. "Measuring Vulnerability to Poverty with Latent Transition Analysis," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 151(1), pages 1-31, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    loneliness; social isolation; social support; UK Biobank; economic gradients;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I1 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health
    • J1 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp14731. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Holger Hinte (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/izaaade.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.