Social Support And Well-Being of Older Adults in Eastern Asia: a Systematic Review

Abstract

Introduction : This study aimed to critically review empirical studies on social support and well-being among older adults in five Eastern Asian countries/communities - The People’s Republic of China, Hong Kong, Chinese Taipei, Japan, and South Korea. Focuses were put on the conceptualization and constructs of social support and its relationships with physical and psychological well-being. The roles played by gender and the Asian cultural context were also examined. Method : Key words such as social support and well-being were used to search the articles in four electronic databases, supplemented by Internet searches. After further screening by six inclusion criteria, 46 studies were analyzed. Results : We found that a large proportion of the studies were atheoretical. Findings revealed that: 1) operational definitions of social support varied, mainly because many studies used secondary data; 2) the findings on the role of the three dimensions of social support on well-being of older adults in Eastern Asia were inconclusive; 3) the role of gender was not consistent; 4) cultural specific conceptualization of social support was identified in some of the studies, which showed promise in reflecting the intergenerational family context in Asia. Conclusion : In East Asia context, theories on social support and well-being did not play significant roles in guiding the operationalization of measurements. The themes identified should be considered by future researchers to advance cultural-specific knowledge building in Asian and cross-cultural literature on social support and physical and psychological well-being of older adults.