Highlights
- •The type of social activity is important in the context of healthy behaviours.
- •Participation in multiple social activities leads to engagement in healthy behaviours.
- •Our findings suggest the importance of both the type and the number of social activities.
Abstract
Objectives
To examine the longitudinal association between participation in social activities
and healthy lifestyle behaviours.
Study design
This 2-year follow-up study used data from 6168 older adults (73.5 ± 5.3 years; 49%
men). We studied participation in five types of social activities at baseline: participation
in volunteer, sports, hobbies, senior clubs, and neighbourhood-association groups.
Main outcome measures
The healthy lifestyle behaviours were physical activity (time spent walking: ≥150 min/week;
or less), eating habits (dietary variety score: ≥4 points; or less), and intellectual
activity (subcomponents of the Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Gerontology Index of
Competence: 4 points; or less).
Results
In the follow-up survey, 19% of participants were physically inactive, 53% had unfavourable
eating habits, and 34% had diminished intellectual activity. Multilevel modified Poisson
regression analysis showed that participation in sports groups was associated with
a lower relative risk (RR) of physical inactivity (RR=0.82 [0.72, 0.93]) and unfavourable
eating habits (RR=0.95 [0.90, 1.00]). Participation in hobby groups reduced the RR
of unfavourable eating habits (RR=0.93 [0.90, 0.97]) and diminished intellectual activity
(RR=0.90 [0.85, 0.96]). Participation in volunteering was associated with a lower
RR of diminished intellectual activity (RR=0.84 [0.75, 0.95]). Relative to non-participation,
participating in two or more social activities was associated with a 9% (95% CI: 0.83,
1.00) lower RR for physical inactivity, a 12% (95% CI: 0.82, 0.95) lower RR for unfavourable
eating habits, and a 17% (95% CI: 0.77, 0.89) lower RR for diminished intellectual
activity.
Conclusions
Both the nature and the number of social activities determine the longitudinal effects
of social participation on healthy lifestyle behaviours.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: October 09, 2021
Accepted:
October 7,
2021
Received in revised form:
September 21,
2021
Received:
April 14,
2021
Identification
Copyright
© 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
