Psychosocial Factors Associated with Longevity in the United States: Age Differences between the Old and Oldest-Old in the Health and Retirement Study

Table 3

Differences in loneliness between the old (age 70–79) and the oldest-old (age 90–104), HRS 2006/2008.

	N	Often	Sometimes	Hardly ever/Never	P
Lack companionship
Age 70–79	4,109	9.9	34.0	56.1	<.000
Age 90–104	269	17.1	39.7	43.2
Feel left out
Age 70–79	4,095	6.1	33.3	60.6	n.s.
Age 90–104	265	7.4	37.4	55.2
Feel isolated
Age 70–79	4,082	6.3	26.1	67.7	.085
Age 90–104	265	10.3	26.8	62.9
Loneliness scale		Mean (s.d.)
Age 70–79	4,123	1.46 (0.61)			<.001
Age 90–104	274	1.58 (0.61)

Note: Figures shown are weighted sample sizes and percentages and weighted scale means with standard deviation in parentheses. 𝑃 values denoting statistical significance of age differences were obtained using Wald chi square tests for the items and 𝑡 tests from bivariate OLS regression for the scale mean.