IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v71y2010i12p2141-2149.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Inventory and analysis of definitions of social participation found in the aging literature: Proposed taxonomy of social activities

Author

Listed:
  • Levasseur, Mélanie
  • Richard, Lucie
  • Gauvin, Lise
  • Raymond, Émilie

Abstract

Social participation is a key determinant of successful and healthy aging and therefore an important emerging intervention goal for health professionals. Despite the interest shown in the concept of social participation over the last decade, there is no agreement on its definition and underlying dimensions. This paper provides an inventory and content analysis of definitions of social participation in older adults. Based on these results, a taxonomy of social activities is proposed. Four databases (Medline, CINAHL, AgeLine and PsycInfo) were searched with relevant keywords (Aging OR Ageing OR Elderly OR Older OR Seniors AND Community involvement/participation OR Social engagement/involvement/participation) resulting in the identification of 43 definitions. Using content analysis, definitions were deconstructed as a function of who, how, what, where, with whom, when, and why dimensions. Then, using activity analysis, we explored the typical contexts, demands and potential meanings of activities (main dimension). Content analysis showed that social participation definitions (n = 43) mostly focused on the person's involvement in activities providing interactions with others in society or the community. Depending on the main goal of these social activities, six proximal to distal levels of involvement of the individual with others were identified: 1) doing an activity in preparation for connecting with others, 2) being with others, 3) interacting with others without doing a specific activity with them, 4) doing an activity with others, 5) helping others, and 6) contributing to society. These levels are discussed in a continuum that can help distinguish social participation (levels 3 through 6) from parallel but different concepts such as participation (levels 1 through 6) and social engagement (levels 5 and 6). This taxonomy might be useful in pinpointing the focus of future investigations and clarifying dimensions specific to social participation.

Suggested Citation

  • Levasseur, Mélanie & Richard, Lucie & Gauvin, Lise & Raymond, Émilie, 2010. "Inventory and analysis of definitions of social participation found in the aging literature: Proposed taxonomy of social activities," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(12), pages 2141-2149, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:71:y:2010:i:12:p:2141-2149
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277-9536(10)00718-5
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lindström, Martin, 2005. "Ethnic differences in social participation and social capital in Malmö, Sweden: a population-based study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 60(7), pages 1527-1546, April.
    2. Ellaway, Anne & Macintyre, Sally, 2007. "Is social participation associated with cardiovascular disease risk factors?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(7), pages 1384-1391, April.
    3. Thompson, Elizabeth, 2004. "The Importance of," The American Statistician, American Statistical Association, vol. 58, pages 198-198, August.
    4. Aleksej Bukov & Ineke Maas & Thomas Lampert, 2002. "Social Participation in Very Old Age," The Journals of Gerontology: Series B, The Gerontological Society of America, vol. 57(6), pages 510-517.
    5. Boneham, Margaret Anne & Sixsmith, Judith A, 2006. "The voices of older women in a disadvantaged community: Issues of health and social capital," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 62(2), pages 269-279, January.
    6. Verbrugge, Lois M. & Jette, Alan M., 1994. "The disablement process," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 1-14, January.
    7. Zunzunegui, M. V. & Koné, A. & Johri, M. & Béland, F. & Wolfson, C. & Bergman, H., 2004. "Social networks and self-rated health in two French-speaking Canadian community dwelling populations over 65," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 58(10), pages 2069-2081, May.
    8. Del Bono, Emilia & Sala, Emanuela & Hancock, Ruth & Parisi, Lavinia & Gunnell, Caroline, 2007. "Gender, older people and social exclusion: a gendered review and secondary analysis of the data," ISER Working Paper Series 2007-13, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    9. Lindström, Martin & Hanson, Bertil S. & Östergren, Per-Olof, 2001. "Socioeconomic differences in leisure-time physical activity: the role of social participation and social capital in shaping health related behaviour," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 52(3), pages 441-451, February.
    10. Badley, Elizabeth M., 2008. "Enhancing the conceptual clarity of the activity and participation components of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(11), pages 2335-2345, June.
    11. Berkman, Lisa F. & Glass, Thomas & Brissette, Ian & Seeman, Teresa E., 2000. "From social integration to health: Durkheim in the new millennium," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 51(6), pages 843-857, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Henrike Galenkamp & Dorly J. H. Deeg, 2016. "Increasing social participation of older people: are there different barriers for those in poor health? Introduction to the special section," European Journal of Ageing, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 87-90, June.
    2. Tim Goedemé & Tess Penne & Otto Swedrup & Karel Van den Bosch & Bérénice Storms, 2019. "Exploring common ground for defining adequate social participation in 24 EU capital cities," Working Papers 1912, Herman Deleeck Centre for Social Policy, University of Antwerp.
    3. Chen, Jen-Hao & Lauderdale, Diane S. & Waite, Linda J., 2016. "Social participation and older adults' sleep," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 164-173.
    4. Almedom, Astier M., 2005. "Social capital and mental health: An interdisciplinary review of primary evidence," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 61(5), pages 943-964, September.
    5. Ivory, Vivienne C. & Collings, Sunny C. & Blakely, Tony & Dew, Kevin, 2011. "When does neighbourhood matter? Multilevel relationships between neighbourhood social fragmentation and mental health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 72(12), pages 1993-2002, June.
    6. Mathieu Philibert & Robert Pampalon & Mark Daniel, 2015. "Conceptual and Operational Considerations in Identifying Socioenvironmental Factors Associated with Disability among Community-Dwelling Adults," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 12(4), pages 1-21, April.
    7. Khaksar, Seyed Mohammad Sadegh & Khosla, Rajiv & Chu, Mei Tai & Shahmehr, Fatemeh S., 2016. "Service Innovation Using Social Robot to Reduce Social Vulnerability among Older People in Residential Care Facilities," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 113(PB), pages 438-453.
    8. Rouquette, Alexandra & Badley, Elizabeth M. & Falissard, Bruno & Dub, Timothée & Leplege, Alain & Coste, Joël, 2015. "Moderators, mediators, and bidirectional relationships in the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) framework: An empirical investigation using a longitudinal design," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 133-142.
    9. Parsons, Margaret A. & Askland, Kathleen D., 2007. "Determinants of prostate cancer stage in northern New England: USA Franco-American contextual effects," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 65(10), pages 2018-2030, November.
    10. Witvorapong, Nopphol, 2018. "Healthy behaviours and productive activities among Thai older adults: A repeated cross-sectional analysis," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 213(C), pages 12-19.
    11. Tuula Oksanen & Ichiro Kawachi & Anne Kouvonen & Etsuji Suzuki & Soshi Takao & Noora Sjösten & Marianna Virtanen & Jaana Pentti & Jussi Vahtera & Mika Kivimäki, 2011. "Workplace Social Capital and Adherence to Antihypertensive Medication: A Cohort Study," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 6(9), pages 1-8, September.
    12. Legh-Jones, Hannah & Moore, Spencer, 2012. "Network social capital, social participation, and physical inactivity in an urban adult population," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 74(9), pages 1362-1367.
    13. Wiles, Janine L. & Rolleston, Anna & Pillai, Avinesh & Broad, Joanna & Teh, Ruth & Gott, Merryn & Kerse, Ngaire, 2017. "Attachment to place in advanced age: A study of the LiLACS NZ cohort," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 185(C), pages 27-37.
    14. Terese Sara Høj Jørgensen & Rikke Lund & Volkert Dirk Siersma & Charlotte Juul Nilsson, 2018. "Interplay between financial assets and social relations on decline in physical function and mortality among older people," European Journal of Ageing, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 133-142, June.
    15. Denis Gerstorf & Nilam Ram & Jan Goebel & Jürgen Schupp & Ulman Lindenberger & Gert G. Wagner, 2010. "Where People Live and Die Makes a Difference: Individual and Geographic Disparities in Well-Being Progression at the End of Life," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 287, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    16. Ma, Mingming, 2019. "Does children's education matter for parents’ health and cognition? Evidence from China," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 222-240.
    17. Rosaria Lumino & Giancarlo Ragozini & Marijtje Duijn & Maria Prosperina Vitale, 2017. "A mixed-methods approach for analysing social support and social anchorage of single mothers’ personal networks," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 51(2), pages 779-797, March.
    18. Jenny Gierveld & Pearl A. Dykstra & Niels Schenk, 2012. "Living arrangements, intergenerational support types and older adult loneliness in Eastern and Western Europe," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 27(7), pages 167-200.
    19. van Zon, Sander K.R. & Bültmann, Ute & Reijneveld, Sijmen A. & de Leon, Carlos F. Mendes, 2016. "Functional health decline before and after retirement: A longitudinal analysis of the Health and Retirement Study," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 26-34.
    20. Damiano Fiorillo & Giuseppe Lubrano Lavadera & Nunzia Nappo, 2020. "Individual Heterogeneity in the Association Between Social Participation and Self-rated Health: A Panel Study on BHPS," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 151(2), pages 645-667, September.

    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:eee:socmed:v:71:y:2010:i:12:p:2141-2149. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    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.