/ W STATI/ARTICLES
G E N Ľ L R A V Ý Z K U M
GENDER AND RESEARCH
Exclusion from Social Relations in Later Life
and the Role of Gender: A Heuristic Model1
Marja Aartsen, Kieran Walsh, Feliciano Villar,
Ariela Lowenstein, Ruth Katz, Sigal Pearl Nairn,
Andreas Motel-Klingebiel, Anna Wanka,
Anna Urbaniak, Thomas Hansen, Lucie Vidovičová
Abstract: Being socially connected is a universal human need, but a substantial number of
older men and women are or become excluded from these connections in later life. Exclusion
from social relations (ESR) is unwanted as it undermines people's ability to lead a healthy,
active, and independent life. Policies to reduce this form of exclusion have been limited in
effectiveness, due in part to a broader lack of knowledge about the dynamics of social
exclusion in older ages and the intersection of social exclusion with gender constructions. To
advance our understanding of ESR in later life, we develop a heuristic model based on theories
and previous empirical studies. Considering the gendered constructing forces of ESR in older
age that can potentially lead to loneliness and reduced health and wellbeing, the model
identifies individual drivers, such as biopsychosocial conditions, personal standards and I ife-course
transitions, and macro-level drivers, such as norms and welfare state provisions. This
model can serve as a conceptual platform for further theoretical development and empirical
study on the gendered construction of ESR in later life. While our focus is on drivers of ESR
and its outcomes, potential reversed effects are also discussed.
Keywords: social exclusion, social relations, older age
Aartsen, Marja, Walsh, Kieran, Villar, Feliciano, Lowenstein, Ariela, Katz, Ruth, Nairn,
Sigal Pearl, Motel-Klingebiel, Andreas, Wanka, Anna, Urbaniak, Anna, Hansen, Thomas,
Vidovičová, Lucie. 2021. Exclusion from Social Relations in Later Life and the Role
of Gender: A Heuristic Model. Gender a výzkum I Gender and Research 22 (1): 16-35,
http://dx.doi.org/10.13060/gav.2021.005.
1
Acknowledgements: This study is funded by the GENDER-NET Plus ERANET COFUND project, which has
received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under
grant agreement no. 741874. The national teams were supported by the following grants: Austria (FWF
I4210/GNP187), Czechia (TACR ZETA TJ03000002), Ireland (GNP-187), Israel (MSTS 3-15667), Norway
(NFR 299859), Spain (PCI2019-103627), Sweden (Vetenskapsradet 2018-00929). The authors declare
no conflict of interest.
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Social exclusion is a broad concept, and in the context of older men's and women's
lives it can be understood as the process in which people are or become separated
from mainstream society (Moffatt, Glasgow 2009). The term social exclusion originally
referred to those in poverty and who were excluded economically as a result of
being unprotected by social insurance (e.g. homeless people, refugee and migrant
populations). Despite research perspectives emphasising the multidimensionality
of the phenomenon and incorporating material, social, civic, socio-cultural, and
neighbourhood and community factors (e.g., Levitas, Pantazis, Fahmy, Gordon,
Lloyd-Reichling, Patsios 2007; Walsh, Scharf, Keating 2017; Van Regenmortel, De
Donder, Smetcoren, Lambotte, De Witte, Verte 2018; Dahlberg, McKee, Fritzell,
Heap, Lennartson 2020), this narrow economic focus is still visible in present-day
understandings within European policy. The European Commission, for example,
defines social exclusion as being at risk of poverty, severe material deprivation, and/or
living in households with very low work intensity (Eurostat 2015). Increasing attention,
however, especially with respect to later-life experiences, is being directed at the social
relational elements of the construct (Bak 2018) and the capacity of exclusion from
social relations (ESR) to create a significant social disadvantage for heterogeneous
populations of older men and women. Not many studies have given comprehensive
and multifaceted consideration to ESR in older age, but there are some notable
exceptions. In a critical review of the literature, Burholt et al. (2020) described ESR
as an unwanted situation for both individuals and society, leading to lower levels of
physical and mental health and lower levels of well-being, increased societal costs,
and reduced social cohesion. It is the broader concept of social exclusion, and its
manifestation in and its influence on the lives of older men and women, that is the
focus of this article.
Despite the valuable contributions of some recent work (Van Regenmortel et
al. 2021; Precupetu, Aartsen, Vasile 2019; Burholt et al. 2020), a major gap in the
literature on ESR has been the limited attention devoted to the gendered construction
of ESR and the influence of the gendered construction of ESR in older age. How
the combined influence of individual (e.g. biopsychosocial conditions, life-course
transitions) and macro socio-economic drivers (e.g. welfare state provisions; normative
practices and values) operate through ESR to generate gender differences in loneliness,
health, and wellbeing is also poorly understood. While some women can potentially
possess all the major risk factors for ESR (e.g., being widowed, in poor health, with
low income), there has been limited theoretical discussion of gender as an individual-level
characteristic and as a constructed social position in experiences of this form of
disadvantage. Gender differences can often be more pronounced in older age, where
the combined negative effects of being old and being female on social exclusion is
greater than being old or female alone. This indicates a potential double jeopardy for
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older women (Chappell, Havens 1980; Wenger, Davies, Shahtahmasebi, Scott 1996;
Bradshaw, Kemp, Baldwin, Rowe 2004; Viruell-Fuentes, Miranda, Abdulrahim 2012;
Kieny, Flores, Maurer, 2020). Nevertheless, as the construction and consequences of
ESR may be different for heterogeneous groups of people, as well as across different
societies (Crenshaw 1991), not all older women face significant risks of exclusion,
and some older men can be particularly vulnerable to social disconnection. There are
complex orders of advantage and disadvantage, oppression, and discrimination, which
can bolster the role of gender in ESR based on the location of different individuals
and groups at the intersection of age, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and economic
background.
The aim of this paper marks an initial effort to further develop the framework
presented by Burholt et al. (2020) into a heuristic model that explicates the gendered
pathways of ESR, and the outcomes for loneliness, health, and wellbeing in later life.
Based on theory and previous empirical research, we will examine how individualand
macro-level drivers may create gender differences in ESR and use this model to
emphasise factors that need to be considered when studying gendered aspects of
ESR in later life. Our model also utilises aspects of the social convoy model of social
relations (cf. Antonucci, Ajrouch, Birditt 2013; Fuller, Ajrouch, Antonucci 2020). The
convoy model is a framework for understanding the determinants and outcomes of
supportive intimate relationships, called the 'social convoy', that surround individuals
and develop with them throughout their life course. People move in and out of the
social network over the life course, and those who are the least close can become
intimates as people age. Our model differs from the convoy model in the sense that
it focuses not only on intimate social relations but on the three 'spheres of sociability'
(Gallie, Paugam, Jacobs 2003): the household, the social network, and the wider
society. Since we are interested in how drivers can contribute to the creation of ESR
outcomes, and not vice versa, we do not focus on potential circular and reinforcing
inter-relationships, where health and wellbeing can also serve as drivers of ESR,
leading to changes in an individual's conditions and transitions. Like the social convoy
model (Antonucci et al. 2013), in our model we also apply a life-course perspective
(Elder 1994), where we consider conditions, opportunities, and decisions in earlier life
phases to be important factors for ESR, with their impact and influence depending
on historical and contextual positioning and origins in time and place. Life transitions,
such as moving from wife to widow or from worker to retiree, are an important aspect
of this perspective and can be accompanied by a shrinkage/change in family and social
networks, contributing to a higher risk of social disadvantage (Yang, Victor 2011).
We also acknowledge that people's current levels of ESR can be partly dependent on
developments in other people's lives, exposing the influence and relevance of 'linkedlives'
in the life-course analysis of social relations and resources.
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We begin by presenting the development of our definition of ESR in later life. Next,
we describe potential individual- and macro-level drivers of ESR for older populations,
followed by a discussion of theories on the intersection of these drivers with gender.
We then present some methodological issues that may arise when measuring
ESR. We conclude by presenting our heuristic model and a short discussion of the
challenges involved in inferring and assessing causal relationships within this topic.
Towards a definition of exclusion from social relations
In using the term social relations, we refer to both interpersonal intimate connections
with other individuals, and more general social relationships in the wider society
that are valued by an older person. While all relationships may be important, social
relations can have varying degrees of intimacy (e.g. partner, child, friend, neighbour,
club members). A person's collection of social relations can vary in structure (size,
composition, or frequency of contact) and function (e.g. support provision, stress
buffering, socialising). Following Gallie et al. (2003), we include three domains of social
relations: the household, the social network, and the wider society. The household
consists of relations that are generally the closest, in physical and emotional terms (e.g.
a partner, children, siblings), with people whom a person typically feels the need to
belong to and connect with. Household relations can often provide the vast majority
of support in times of crises because of their level of intimacy and proximity. The social
network refers to the collection of people from outside the household, with whom
a person also feels closely connected and maintains interpersonal relations and from
whom a person may receive support. Wider society is used here to incorporate the
contacts and exchanges that, while they may be the least close, are still important for
providing valuable opportunities to connect with mainstream society, such as through
voluntary work or political participation.
Across these three spheres, we consider ESR for older men and women as an
objective (e.g. number of relations), subjective (e.g. perceived quality), and continuous
multidimensional concept. We focus on its continuous nature, as a person is not
included or excluded in a binary form, but rather can be excluded from one or more
dimensions to various degrees. The multidimensional construction of ESR is considered
as it incorporates/implicates the relationships, networks, supports, and opportunities
that the three relational spheres represent. On this basis, we define ESR for older men
and women as a situation in which people are socially and emotionally disconnected
from adequate levels of intimate relationships, social networks, social support, and/
or social opportunities.
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Drivers of ESR
In our discussion of drivers of ESR, we argue that ESR in later life arises from the
direct effects on the individual and macro level, as well as from the intersection
of processes and outcomes on these two levels. The function of this section is to
provide a very brief overview of both sets of drivers. While their intersection with
gender is highlighted where appropriate, this is primarily dealt with in a subsequent
section.
Individual drivers
Individual aspects that we consider relevant for ESR and its outcomes are conditions,
relationship standards, and life-course transitions. With conditions, we refer to the
biopsychosocial conditions of an individual that shape their engagement with other
people, such as gender, sexual orientation, income, socio-economic status, migration,
and physical, mental, and cognitive health (Burholt et al. 2020). While women tend
to have more kinship relations in the network than men (McPherson, Smith-Lovin,
Brashears 2006), they are also more often widowed because of their longer life
expectancy. Older lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) adults more often
live alone and are less likely to have children compared to people with a heterosexual
orientation (Yang, Victor 2018). They are also considered to be more often excluded
as a result of the prejudicial attitudes of other people and service providers (ibidem).
Poor mental and physical health impairs a person's ability to maintain their preferred
level of social interaction (Bertoni, Celidoni, Weber 2015; Coyle, Dugan 2017; Croda
2015). While an increased need for support may mobilise helpers (Van Tilburg 1998),
it can also lead to a reduction of helpers if the increased need arises from cognitive
deterioration (Aartsen, Van Tilburg, Smits, Knipscheer 2004). A low socioeconomic
status has been linked to having a lower-quality network (in terms of intimacy and
providing support), which in turn leads to poor health (Aartsen, Veenstra, Hansen
2017). Low income, material deprivation, and poverty further limit participation in the
wider community and compromise a person's ability to optimise their social network
(Ajrouch, Blandon, Antonucci 2005). Relationship standards refer to the expectations
that people have with respect to the level and nature of engagement with their network
members. Relationship standards can act as motivators to maintain or enhance the
quality and quantity of social relations people have, and those with high standards may
work to replace social relations with new ones if they are lost. High standards may also
induce loneliness if they are unrealistic, or simply not achievable given other personal,
social, and economic parameters (De Jong Gierveld, Van Tilburg, Dykstra 2016). Major
transitions in life, such as retirement, widowhood, divorce, or other forms of partnership
dissolution, can function to shrink a person's social network if the lost relationships
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are not replaced by others (Bekhet, Zauszniewski 2012; Dahlberg, Andersson, McKee,
Lennartsson 2015; Van Tilburg, Aartsen, Van der Pas 2015). Finally, migration within
a country or across national boundaries can have a profoundly negative effect on social
relations, as people who migrate are cut off from their primary contacts (Ajrouch et
al. 2005; De Jong Gierveld, Van der Pas, Keating 2015).
Macro-level drivers
With macro-level drivers, we refer to the forces at the local and societal level that
construct or influence ESR, such as neighbourhood qualities, norms and values,
population turnover, and welfare state provisions. Aspects of the neighbourhood
that are relevant to ESR include social, cultural, and health facilities within the locality
and the walkability of the streets or the community, all of which can mediate social
contact and the formation of social networks (Büffel, Phillipson, Scharf 2013; Walsh,
O'Shea, Scharf 2019). Deprived neighbourhoods can possess higher crime rates,
which increases the risk of victimisation for older people, and decreases personal
mobility x
and socialisation within local settings (Scharf, Phillipson, Smith 2005).
A sense of safety, which is not the same as objective measures of crime, can be
related to a sense of belonging and place-based identity, which are important for
fostering social interaction within the locality (Acierno, Rheinold, Resnick, Kilpatrick
2004). In countries where the norm is to be married and to rely on family when in
need of support, people often have larger networks than those in individualistic
countries, where people are more often alone (Yang, Victor 2011; Fokkema, De Jong
Gierveld, Dykstra 2012; Sundström, Fransson, Malmberg, Davey 2009). Large-scale
population turnover (such as that driven by immigration) at both the country-level and
neighbourhood-level can reduce social cohesion, which undermines trust, reciprocity,
and collective forms of socialisation, and that in turn increases the risk of ESR (Kearns,
Bailey, Gannon, Livingston, Leyland 2014). Evidence also suggests that welfare state
provisions can directly impact integration. For example, a study conducted in Israel
found that well-developed and adequate services, facilitated by local associations,
enabled older people to become more involved in the community and to experience
a greater level of integration in society (Brick, lekovitch, Nairn 2018). Hence, macrolevel
drivers may impact all three levels of ESR: the household, the social network,
and the wider society.
Interrelations between individual and macro-level drivers of ESR
The impact that individual drivers have on ESR may not be independent from macrolevel
drivers, and the risk of being socially excluded differs across European countries
(Tsakloglou, Papadopoulos 2002). Strong social policies typical for social democratic
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welfare regimes may lower the negative impact of individual factors through processes
of decommodification and defamilialisation. Decommodification is the degree to
which an individual or family can uphold a socially acceptable standard of living
independent of labour-market participation (Esping-Andersen 1999). Defamilialisation
refers to actions taken by the state to support professional care services for the
purpose of facilitating greater participation of women in the work force, such as
universal or subsidised childcare services and welfare support for part-time work
(Mandel, Shalev 2009). It is therefore important to consider the macro-social context
when analysing drivers and outcomes of ESR.
Relational standards, previously discussed as motivators for social interaction, can be
shaped by culturally defined gender norms linked to being alone and/or the provision
of care and support. While people in southern collectivistic countries expect help from
their family and friends when they are in need of care, people in individualistic Nordic
countries have lower expectations as they can rely on professional organisations for
their support (Jylha, Jokela 1990). Therefore, people who are a little more isolated
with a little less support may be more likely to experience feelings of loneliness
in collectivistic countries. This is supported by a growing number of cross-national
studies that have observed that despite the higher number of people who are alone
in the northwest of Europe, the prevalence of loneliness is lower than in the southeast
of Europe (Jylha, Jokela 1990; Yang, Victor 2011; Fokkema, De Jong Gierveld, Dykstra
2012; Hansen, Slagsvold 2016; Sundstrom, Fransson, Malmberg, Davey 2009). Welfare
state provisions, such as professional health care or social services, may compensate
for the absence of social relations that are important for the individual (Broese van
Groenou, De Boer 2016), which may lead to a weakened association between ESR,
on the one hand, and loneliness health, and wellbeing, on the other.
The life-course perspective (Elder, 1994) provides a framework with which to
understand how and why individual and macro-level drivers of ESR interact. Applied
to exclusionary processes, it emphasises how an individual's current level of ESR can
be shaped by earlier conditions, opportunities, and decisions during their lives. It is
also shaped by historical and temporal and geographical/spatial context as the choices
people make in life are bounded by circumstances, such as those regulating genderbased
expectations, roles, and institutional support, which vary across time, place,
and social group. As noted by Dewilde (2003), individual differences in education
levels are shaped by the family in which people are born including the household
expectations regarding male and female children, and the opportunity structures
provided by the welfare system to access education. This affects the ability of men
and women to accumulate financial and social resources over the life course and the
various ways in which social groups rewards the decisions of individuals.
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Exclusion from social relations and the impact on loneliness, health,
and wellbeing
Although ESR and loneliness are highly correlated, they are not the same. Some
people can feel lonely even if they are objectively well-embedded in a social network,
and not all people who are excluded from social relations do feel lonely (De Jong
Gierveld et al. 2016). Loneliness is a perceived state and arises when there is an
unacceptable discrepancy between the quality and quantity of the social relations
that an older man or woman has and what they would like to have (Perlman, Peplau
1982). In line with the Burholt et al. (2020) framework and the cognitive approach
to loneliness developed by Perlman and Peplau (1982), we consider loneliness an
outcome of ESR. Both ESR and loneliness can lead to adverse health and wellbeing
outcomes.
The extent to which health outcomes should be attributed to ESR, to loneliness,
or to both in a linear process of construction is not always clear (Steptoe et al. 2013).
Some studies associate ESR with an increased mortality risk that is comparable to
long-standing risk behaviours, such as smoking, obesity, or lack of physical activity
(Alcaraz et al. 2019; Holt-Lunstad, Smith, Layton 2010), with similar effects being
observed for loneliness (Luo et al. 2012). ESR was also found to be related to an
increase in general health problems in older age, such as higher blood pressure and
coronary disease (Thurston, Kubzansky 2009; Tomaka, Thompson, Palacios 2006),
and a decline in cognitive function (Shankar, Rafnsson, Steptoe 2015). Older people
who are experiencing loneliness tend to have more physical-health consultations
with a doctor (Gerst-Emerson, Jayawardhana 2015), and their self-rated health is
typically significantly worse than people who are not experiencing loneliness (Coyle,
Dugan 2012).
ESR and loneliness are also associated with a number of wellbeing aspects. Higher
levels of loneliness are associated with poorer life satisfaction (Bai, Yan, Knapp 2018),
lower self-esteem, mistrust, and a lack of self-confidence (Masi et al. 2011), and with
higher levels of anger, anxiety, pessimism, and depression (Cacioppo et al. 2006).
Longitudinal studies on loneliness point to how mental health outcomes of loneliness
in older age might be greater than in other life stages (e.g. Dykstra et al. 2005; Victor,
Bowling 2012). In line with the cumulative advantage/disadvantage theory (Dannefer
2003), this can be interpreted as an accumulation of disadvantages, as the oldest old
people experience the greatest cumulative exposure. In sum, there is solid evidence
that ESR leads to increased loneliness, and ESR and loneliness may have independent
and combined negative effects on health and wellbeing.
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The role of gender
Uptothis point, we have only referenced gender differences, as they pertain in a cursory
way to drivers and outcomes. In this section, we focus on the specific role that gender
can play in relation to ESR. With gender, we refer to the roles and responsibilities of
people as constructed by families, societies, and cultures, which are generally distinct
for men and women. A social role can be seen as a set of social relations between
a person and a social circle involving negotiated duties obligations, rights, and privileges
(Lopata 2006). Microstructural perspectives on gender inequalities have emphasised the
importance of social roles and socialisation in constructing gender differences. Based
on differences in socialisation (Stockard 2006), gendered social roles in the private
and public sphere have different opportunities to create or maintain relations in the
three spheres of sociability. As men most often occupy roles in the public sphere and
women roles in the private sphere of the household (Lopata 2006), the prescribed social
roles may lead to gender inequalities in ESR and loneliness. For example, women are
typically the primary caregivers for children in married or partnered households, and it
is also often women who have children in their care after a divorce (McLanahan, Kelly
2006). These responsibilities limit the possibilities women have for paid employment
outside the home, which can potentially lead to an accumulation of disadvantages and
increased gender inequalities with respect to the different facets of economic and social
participation (Dunn, Skaggs 2006). As a consequence, older women are more likely
to be excluded from social relations and more likely to be lonely. However, it is also
observed that divorce in midlife leads to a higher increase in loneliness among men,
compared to women, which can sometimes be due to women possessing alternative
sources of support (Dykstra, Fokkema 2007).
Gender theories that emphasise a macro-structural perspective may further help to
illuminate gender inequalities in ESR. A relevant example that uses this perspective is
the feminisation of poverty, and poverty increases the risk of ESR and loneliness (Scharf,
Phillipson, Smith 2005). There are various explanations for this, including changing family
structures (e.g. first marriages occurring at a later age and an increase in divorce rates)
and the meagre welfare benefits that certain groups of women sometimes receive,
including various kinds of carer allowances (McLanahan, Kelly 2006). Moreover, older
women tend to have lower levels of education and this has ramifications for a range of
different exclusionary outcomes throughout the life course. This includes earning not
only less than their male counterparts, but often experiencing more disrupted working
careers because of their role in family care. As a result, older women are likely to receive
lower pensions and consequently encounter higher risks of poverty (Eurostat 2015). An
increasing proportion of single people, therefore, have to rely on their own economic
resources, and these resources are generally lower for women than for men. Gender
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thus creates the basis for women to end up in a more disadvantaged position than
men, and although differences between men and women may not be that clear-cut,
it is a cross-cutting and overarching factor in our model.
Theoretical perspectives on ESR-changes over time
While we discussed ESR mainly as a static situation of exclusion, we acknowledge
its dynamic nature, as people can move in and out of a situation in which they are
excluded from social relations (Burholt et al. 2020; Antonucci et al. 2013). Individual
transitions and changes in resources affect a person's risk of being excluded, and
experiencing one form of exclusion can raise the odds of experiencing exclusion in
other domains (Walsh et al. 2017). Events in society such as the housing crisis in 2008
have increased the number of homeless and poor people, and homelessness and
poverty can in turn make it more difficult to maintain and improve social relations, at
least during a crisis. The social distancing that was introduced to reduce the spread of
the Coronavirus in 2020 has also resulted - hopefully temporarily - in the exclusion of
people from their social networks and has reduced their opportunities to participate in
the wider society. The fact that ESR can change over time is relevant for our theoretical
understanding, it is also important that empirical research acknowledge that the state
of ESR can change over the life course.
A number of theories can be helpful in order to better understand ESR changes. The
Socio-emotional Selectivity Theory (SST) developed by Carstensen (1992) understands
changes in the composition of a social network as a consequence of changing
motivations for particular types of social relations. SST is based on the notion that it
is not age but rather people's perceived time horizon that determines their motivation
to choose certain types of relations. As long as an individual's time horizon is perceived
as open-ended, knowledge-related goals are prioritised. When time is perceived to
be limited, emotional goals become more important. Consequently, when life unfolds
and people become older, their preference for social relations change from relations
that provide knowledge to social relations that provide intimacy and emotional
support. This is likely to be true for men and women, albeit to different degrees.
A scholarly debate in family research that is relevant for changes in household
relations has centred on the conceptualisation of intergenerational relationships
and the solidarity-conflict ambivalence model (Lowenstein 2007; Katz et al. 2005).
The premise of the solidarity-conflict model is that levels of cohesion and conflict
predict parent-child relations and their outcomes in later life. The ambivalence
model states that adult intergenerational relations revolve around sociological and
psychological contradictions. This is important because of the profound increase in
average life expectancy, meaning that more people spend more years within family
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structures, while these structures are constantly changing. Moreover, population
ageing and globalisation have increased the diversity and complexity of family lives
and intergenerational bonds.
Methodological considerations in the assessment of ESR
Before presenting our heuristic model, we address some methodological considerations
related to the key concept of ESR. In our approach to ESR, we distinguish between three
different levels of social relations: the household, the social network, and wider society.
Being excluded from household relations implies a situation in which a person may live
without a partner and/or children in the same household. This includes people who are
divorced or widowed but not remarried, as well as people who never married or have
a partner outside the household. Measuring the social network entails assessing the
network in terms of both quality and quantity. While a large network may potentially
have more support capacity than a small network, this is not necessarily true. Relevant
aspects of the social network with respect to ESR include the structure of the network
(e.g. number of people in the network, contact frequency, and the composition of the
network) and its function (e.g. support provision, the quality of social relations, network
satisfaction). There is a dynamic interplay between network size and the amount of
support provided by the social network, as network members may be less ready to
provide support if the network is large and other people are available to provide support
(Tolkacheva et al. 2011). Therefore, a number of scholars have argued that a network
typology that combines the structural and functional aspects of the social network is
necessary when studying the construction and outcomes of the social network (Wenger
1991; Litwin, Shiovitz-Ezra 2006; Cheng et al. 2009). There are several approaches
to defining network type, one of the first of which was the qualitative approach by
Wenger (1991), which was based on interviews with older people living in Wales (UK).
Inspired by these ideas, quantitative studies have attempted to develop a network
typology, often based on a person-centred approach. The goal of a person-centred
approach - as opposed to variable-centred approaches - is to group people in smaller
homogeneous subgroups of individuals who have the same structural and functional
characteristics of their social network, which is different from other subgroups (Muthen,
Muthen 2000). A helpful method for defining network types in a dataset is Latent Class
Analysis (McCutcheon 1987), which empirically identifies groups of people with the
same social network type based on a number of observed variables that are indicative
of the quality (support exchange, network satisfaction) and the quantity (network size,
composition, contact frequency) of the social network. This method of creating network
typologies was applied in previous studies (e.g., Aartsen et al. 2004; Ellwardt et al.
2017; Litwin 2001; Mikulioniene, Gaizaukaite, Morkevicius 2021). Social connections
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with people in the wider society include a variety of relations that are more distant
but are still important to the individual and are with individuals with whom they are
in regular contact. Voluntary work, participation in social, leisure, or political activities,
or providing help to people outside the household or social network are examples of
social opportunities that connect people to others with whom they are the least close
and connect them to mainstream society.
Towards a heuristic model of gendered ESR
Our heuristic model of ESR builds on the critical review of Burholt et al. (2020) and the
social convoy model (Antonucci et al. 2013) and emphasises gender as a cross-cutting
and overarching factor that influences experiences of ESR in later life. We defined
ESR as a situation in which people are socially and emotionally disconnected from
adequate levels of intimate relationships, social networks, social support, and/or social
opportunities. We incorporated relevant aspects of feminist theory, understandings
of social exclusion in later life, socio-emotional selectivity theory, and the conceptual
interrelationship between solidarity, conflict, and ambivalence. We further argued
that ESR is driven by individual and macro-level factors and the interaction between
the two. We also discussed that ESR leads to increased feelings of loneliness and
diminished health and wellbeing and that individual and macro-level drivers may
modify the strength of these impacts. The heuristic model is depicted in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Heuristic model for the causes and consequences of exclusion from social
relations
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/ W STATI/ARTICLES
Although we present the model mainly in terms of drivers of ESR and its outcomes,
the model does not exclude feedback loops and reversed causation. For example, the
health and wellbeing outcomes in our model may in turn lead to ESR, which was also
acknowledged when discussing the individual drivers of ESR. In addition, it is argued
that loneliness can also motivate people to reconnect or maintain social relations in
the same way that hunger and thirst motivate people to feed the body (Hawkley,
Cacioppo 2010). When analysing and interpreting the heuristic model, scholars should
take into account potential reversed effects.
To conclude, the heuristic model may provide a useful framework for analysing
the origins of gender differences in the prevalence and generation of ESR across
European countries and for identifying the consequences of this exclusion for health
and wellbeing. A next step would be to validate the model, and to do this crossnational
and longitudinal studies are needed. Findings from such studies would be
highly relevant for the scientific debate about gender inequalities in ESR and would
help inform policies for the reduction of the levels of exclusion from social relations
amongst older men and women.
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I BY-NC Marja Aartsen, Kieran Walsh, Feliciano Villar, Ariela Lowenstein, Ruth Katz, Sigal
Pearl Nairn, Andreas Motel-Klingebiel, Anna Wanka, Anna Urbaniak, Thomas Hansen, Lucie
Vidovicova, 2021.
BY-NC Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences, 2021.
Marja Aartsen, PhD, currently works as s research professor at NOVA Norwegian Social
research at Oslo Metropolitan University. She is a sociologist by training and specialised
in longitudinal research on social exclusion, social inequalities, loneliness, and cognitive
functioning in older adults. Contact e-mail: maraar@oslomet.no.
Kieran Walsh is Professor of Ageing and Public Policy and Director of the Irish Centre for
Social Gerontology at National University of Ireland Galway. His research interests include
social exclusion in later life, place and life-course transitions, and informal and formal
infrastructures of care. Contact e-mail: kieran.walsh@nuigalway.ie.
Feliciano Villar, PhD, is a full professor at the Cognition, Developmental, and Educational
Psychology Department of the University of Barcelona. His research focuses on generativity
in later life and the participation and contributions of older people in families and
communities. Contact e-mail: fvillar@ub.edu.
Prof. Emerita Ariela Lowenstein is a member of the Faculty of Welfare & Health Sciences,
Haifa University, Israel. She established the Graduate Department of Gerontology and the
Centre for Research & Study of Aging. Her research interests are intergenerational family
relations, elder abuse and neglect, family caregiving, and gerontological education. Contact
e-mail: ariela@research.haifa.ac.il.
Prof. Emerita Ruth Katz, a family sociologist, is a faculty member of the Sociology
Department and the School of Social Work. She was for several years the head of the
Department of Human Services and a senior researcher at the Center for Research & Study
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of Aging, all at the University of Haifa, Israel. Her research interests are on intergenerational
family relations, family caregiving, family lifestyles, family-work conflict and balance,
successful ageing, and older adults' quality of life. Contact e-mail: ruth@soc.haifa.ac.il.
Sigal Nairn, PhD, is a gerontologist, a lecturer at the Departments of Human Services,
Yezreel Academic College, Israel, and an academic consultant for the programme of
Gerontological Advisory and Treatment Management at the Academic Center for Law and
Science, Israel. She also coordinates the Center for Research and Study of Aging at the
University of Haifa, Israel. Her PhD thesis topic was on older adults' social media activity
(mainly Facebook) - motivations, patterns of use, benefits and risks - and her post-doc
dealt with digital literacy in old age. Contact e-mail: sigaln@yvc.ac.il.
Andreas Motel-Klingebiel, Dr. phil., Sociologist and Gerontologist, is Professor in Ageing
and Later Life and Head of the Division Ageing and Social Change, Department of Culture
and Society, Linkbping University, Sweden. His research focuses on the connections
between key societal processes, life-course trajectories, human ageing, and later life. His
main thematic interests are quality of life, diversity, distributions, social inequality and
exclusion, the life course and individual development, and social and cultural change.
Contact e-mail: andreas.motel-klingebiel@liu.se.
Anna Wanka, PhD, is a sociologist and postdoctoral researcher at Goethe University in
Frankfurt am Main and at the University of Stuttgart in Germany. She is interested in the
social construction of age. Her areas of expertise comprise life-course transitions, the
reproduction of social inequalities across the life course and material gerontology. Contact
e-mail: wanka@em.uni-frankfurt.de.
Anna Urbaniak, PhD, is a sociologist who works on social exclusion in older age. She is
a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Vienna and Jagiellonian University and
a research associate at the Irish Centre for Social Gerontology. Her interest focusses on
spatial aspects of ageing, life-course transitions, the re/production of social inequalities
across the life course, ageing migrants, and people living with dementia. Contact e-mail:
anna.urbaniak@univie.ac.at.
Thomas Hansen, PhD, works as a research professor at the Norwegian Institute of Public
Health and at Norwegian Social Research (NOVA) at Oslo Metropolitan University.
A psychologist by training, his research focuses on subjective well-being, mental health,
loneliness, social isolation, and volunteering in relation to ageing and later life. Contact
e-mail: thomas.hansen@oslomet.no.
Lucie Vidovicova, PhD, is a sociologist. She is a co-founder of CERA - the Centre for
Research on Ageing, a working group of the Department of Sociology at the Faculty of
Social Studies, Masaryk University. Her research interests include age, ageing, and social
roles, and modern technology in ageing societies. Contact e-mail: vidovicova@fss.muni.cz.
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